Description: Overview of public health (responsibilities, funding, challenges) and discussion of the role actuaries can play in achieving population health goals.

Description: Essays show a new system that will encompass minor changes to the current health insurance system, it will allow consumers to sign up for Federal Employees Health Benefit Plan and be administered like Medicare but with more benefits and emphasis on preventive care.

Description: Essay discussing cost, quality and access of healthcare and then describes the need for rationing.

Description: Essential Health Benefits and Actuarial Value

Description: This article reviews Canada's Medicare Plan, the Chaoulli Supreme Court decision and looks at factors affecting waiting times. From Health Watch Newsletter, May 2006, Issue No. 52.

Description: Presentation at October 1985 Annual Meeting. This session will discuss trends in medical technology as they affect health care benefits programs, including: life extension, organ transplants, high-cost procedures, and plan design.

Description: Affordable Care Act and Payment Reform

Description: While there are many approaches currently being taken to transform health care, to be successful, we know that leading and planning for quality improvement is a science. Data is the common denominator as healthcare organizations establish best-practices, and ultimately overcome unintended variation through strong analytic systems. Health care leaders require specialized data analysis education and training to hone their skills in understanding and managing clinical variation. The problem with unexplained variation in healthcare is that it negatively impacts clinical outcomes, increases the cost of care, and diminishes value for patients. In this session, Dr. Ted James (BIDMC and Harvard Medical School Faculty) will explain how actuaries can offer practical solutions that provide insights into variations in clinical practice that cannot be explained by differences in medical conditions or patient preferences.

Description: This paper introduces a single measure combining cost and quality of healthcare. This is used to demonstrate the magnitude of the challenge of the increasing dependency rate. It is then used in assessing a number of alternative financing models, including user fees and alternative compensation methods for physicians. The paper documents implementation issues and evaluates the desirability of implementing these approaches in Canada.

Description: By rationing heath care resources, managed-care organizations have raised ethical and legal issues not commonly found under previous health-care-financing structures. Panelists, including a member of the Board and the Executive Committee of the American Medical Association [AMA], and the audience debate this issue. From the 1997 Record of Society of Actuaries, Vol. 23, No. 3.