Section 1332 State Innovation Waivers, named after the section of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that created them, are intended to allow states to implement innovative or alternative strategies to achieve health coverage. This report highlights five key steps that states should take to understand and evaluate the impact of these waivers on older adults.
This fact sheet describes the telehealth-provided services available to Medicare beneficiaries, including both current and new services resulting from recent policy changes.
The latest Rx Price Watch report by Leigh Purvis and Dr. Stephen W. Schondelmeyer finds that retail prices for widely used specialty prescription drugs increased by 7.0 percent between 2016 and 2017.
Section 1115 waivers are intended to give states the flexibility to experiment with new ways to administer their Medicaid programs, including innovative coverage strategies. However, emerging waivers that impose work requirements and other harmful obligations on beneficiaries as conditions of Medicaid participation lead to significant numbers of people losing coverage, even as states incur greater costs.
Trends, Differences by Race and Ethnicity, and Association with Preventive Service Use.
This Spotlight is based on an analysis of administrative claims data from the OptumLabs Data Warehouse. In our sample of Medicare Advantage beneficiaries ages 50 and older with breast cancer, the health care costs in the first year after diagnosis averaged $120,000.
Medicaid is a lifeline for millions of children, adults with low incomes, individuals with disabilities and older adults who depend on Medicaid for health care services and assistance with long-term services and supports (LTSS) such as eating, bathing, and dressing.
This Fact Sheet highlights several key facts that are important to know about Medicaid and the millions of people who depend on this program to address their daily needs.
Dementia medications typically provide modest, short-term benefits and therefore are not intended for long-term use. Nevertheless, findings from a new AARP Public Policy Institute (PPI) report indicate that some adults with dementia remained on these drugs for as long as a decade, increasing the potential for adverse health outcomes and costing nearly $20,000.
This paper describes the consumer perspective on the value of telehealth and the current policy concerns with this avenue of health care delivery. This consumer perspective is provided by AARP’s Public Policy Institute on behalf of older adults and their family caregivers.
This Spotlight is based on an analysis of administrative claims data from the OptumLabs Data Warehouse. In our sample of Medicare Advantage beneficiaries ages 65 and older with dementia living in the community, antipsychotic (AP) use increased by 6% between 2012 and 2015, from 12.6% to 13.4%.
Studies have shown that socially isolated older adults are at greater risk for poor health and death than their well-connected counterparts. Now a new study—the first to examine whether social isolation also affects health care spending among older adults—finds that a lack of social contacts among older adults is associated with an estimated $6.7 billion in additional Medicare spending annually.
The latest Rx Price Watch report by Leigh Purvis and Dr. Stephen W. Schondelmeyer finds that retail prices for widely used prescription drugs increased, on average, between 2006 and 2015. In 2015, retail prices for 768 brand name, generic, and specialty prescription drugs widely used by Medicare beneficiaries increased by an average of 6.4 percent. In contrast, the general inflation rate was 0.1 percent over the same period.
This spotlight is based on an analysis of insurance claims data from the OptumLabs Data Warehouse. We found that surprisingly few women are evaluated or treated for osteoporosis following hip fractures, and these missed opportunities may leave some patients at increased risk for subsequent fractures.
How many people are age 85-plus in your state, and how much is this population projected to grow? Find out here.
New data from the Urban Institute and the AARP Public Policy Institute show that insurance coverage for 50- to 64-year-olds has improved significantly under the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
This report outlines the demographics of this growing cohort and concludes with recommendations for coordinating programmatic resources to better serve it.
The latest Rx Price Watch report by Leigh Purvis and Dr. Stephen Schondelmeyer finds that retail prices for widely used brand name prescription drugs increased substantially faster than general inflation between 2006 and 2015, and that the difference between the rate of brand name drug price increases and the rate of general inflation has been widening.
Rates of unplanned hospital readmissions following elective hip and knee replacement procedures fell markedly among the 50- to 84-year-old population between 2009 and 2013.
