Description: This paper discusses the the continuing cost of health insurance coverage represents a major problem for most of us. However, the long-term continuation of the excess growth rate of the health care economy verses the rest of the economy has the potential makings of a major crisis.

Description: This session discusses how managed care affects the cost and pricing of health care. Included is a discussion of inadequate development and use of practice standards practicing differently for patients covered by different insurers and the malpractice crisis. From the Record of the Society of Actuaries, Volume 29, No. 3, Session 59

Description: Full version of Health Section News, April 2003, Issue No. 45.

Description: Chairperson’s Corner by John P. Cookson from Health Section News, April 2003, Issue No. 45.

Description: This session discussion is about current claim experience,variations by block of business & product, problems in determining claim experience and effect of selection on experience in health care. From Record of Society of Actuaries Vol. 16, No. 1.

Description: Full version of Health Watch News, Issue No. 57, January 2008.

Description: Full version of Health Section News, August 2003, Issue No. 46.

Description: In this session, participants learn the issues large employers face with respect to increased health care costs, the goals and objectives of the value-based purchasing initiative and similar initiatives and the different methods used to implement these initiatives. The Leapfrog Group, a hospital performance initiative, and Bridges to Excellence, a physician performance initiative, are specifically discussed. From the Record of the Society of Actuaries, Volume 30, No. 1, Session 31

Description: This article outlines what the author learned from the Sixth Annual Quality Colloquium at Harvard. From Health Watch, January 2008, Issue No. 57.

Description: Healthcare costs have been rising faster than general inflation for many years. Early models that predicted this past pattern projected healthcare expenditure growth that continued to outpace total expenditure growth leading to the fallacious position that the whole of the US economy would ultimately be consumed by healthcare. The Society of Actuaries' Pension Section and Health Section Research teams commissioned Professor Thomas E. Getzen of Temple University to construct a resource model for the projection of long term healthcare cost trends that includes capacity constraints to ensure the long-term projection is rational. The motivation for creation of the model was driven by its potential usage as a resource for the estimation of reportable liabilities for retiree healthcare benefits as specified under FAS 106 and GASB 45 accounting statements. This is a zip file containing the following: 1. A background paper on the creation of the health trend model, 2. The model, programmed in Microsoft Excel [xls format], that projects per-person expenditures and growth rates through 2099 using baseline assumptions, but also permits the flexibility for user–inputted alternative assumptions, and 3. Technical documentation providing transparency and support for the ultimate results.