Description: Discussion of the implications of the newly unveiled health care reform proposal by Senator Baucus. Key issues include abandonment of the CLASS Act, inclusion of LTC in cafeteria plans, funding and tax concerns, individual mandate, privacy concerns, play-or-pay employer mandate, impact on Medicare and Medicaid, and gridlock in the legislative finalization process.

Description: A comment letter to policymakers produced jointly by the SOA and AAA presents findings from their actuarial analysis of the proposed CLASS Act. The analysis indicates that the proposed structure and funding approaches will be unsustainable, and will cover only a very small proportion of the intended population. The opt-out and guaranteed issue provisions of the plan pose a risk that soon the program will either need increased premiums and/or significant reductions.

Description: Summary of results from survey of LTC Section members, on use of resources, meetings attendanceand topics of interest.

Description: A model for an effective, cost efficient national public LTC/LTCI education program that will increase LTCI sales nationwide.

Description: A discussion of the efforts to implement straight through processing and standardization of the HIPAA form for long term care claims data.

Description: A discussion of fraud and abuse in the Medicare payment system, and steps to address these problems.

Description: A discussion of insurance claims processing and payment systems, and how to achieve the minimum possible number of errors.

Description: An introduction to other articles in this issue about Medicaid abuse and genetic testing.

Description: This article discusses the details of being classified as cognitively impaired, particularly the relationship between being classified as cognitively impaired and subsequent mortality experience and the effect of cognitive impairment on mortality rates.

Description: September 2011 issue of the Long-Term Care Insurance Section newsletter, Long-Term Care News