The Top 5 – ACA and Medicare

With the release of President Obama’s FY2016 budget and the Supreme Court gearing up for the Affordable Care Act fray, there was no shortage of headline policy news in early February. HomeCare’s new weekly effort seeks to bring you the top industry stories from major news outlets. The following five stories topped health care policy news last week.

House G.O.P. Again Votes to Repeal Health Care Law

WASHINGTON—The House passed a bill on Tuesday to repeal the Affordable Care Act for the first time in the new Congress, but Democrats appeared to show more zeal in defending the law than Republicans did in trying to get rid of it. The measure goes now to the Senate, where the majority leader, Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky, has said that the chamber will vote on legislation repealing the health law but has not announced a schedule. (The New York Times/ Robert Pear)

Medicare Should Split from Health Department, Senator Hatch Says

(BLOOMBERG)—Congress should split the agency that runs Obamacare and Medicare from the Department of Health and Human Services to keep the White House from having too much influence over its operation, Senate Finance Chairman Orrin Hatch said.The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which administers the health programs for the elderly and poor, is too big, said Hatch, a Utah Republican. The agency consumes about 85 percent of the health department’s $1 trillion budget. (Bloomberg/ Alexander Wayne)

Supreme Court’s New Health Law Case Cuts Both Ways

WASHINGTON (AP)—The Supreme Court is taking another look at President Barack Obama’s health care law, and this time it’s not just the White House that should be worried. Republican lawmakers and governors, too, will feel the backlash if the court invalidates insurance subsidies worth billions of dollars to people in more than 30 states. (The Associated Press/ Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar)

Debate Heightens Over Measuring Health Care Quality

The Obama administration’s goal of tying more Medicare payments to the quality—not the quantity—of health care by 2018 has intensified the debate over how “quality” is defined and measured. Many doctors, hospitals, insurers and cost experts want to move away from the myriad quality metrics that largely measure process—from tracking the percentage of patients with chest pain who get an aspirin in the ER, to how hair is removed from ambulatory surgery patients—toward broader measures that assess patient outcomes. (The Wall Street Journal/ Melinda Beck)

Budget Plan Sees Savings in Changes to Medicare

WASHINGTON—In his new budget, President Obama proposed on Monday to squeeze $399 billion over the next 10 years out of Medicare, Medicaid and other programs run by the Department of Health and Human Services. Under the proposals, many Medicare beneficiaries would have to pay more for their care and coverage. The president would, for example, introduce a co-payment for new Medicare beneficiaries who receive home health care services, and he would collect $4 billion over 10 years by imposing a surcharge on premiums for new beneficiaries who buy generous private insurance to supplement Medicare. (The New York Times/ Robert Pear)