Healthcare Financial News

A new report from the Institute of Medicine recommends 100 health topics that should get priority attention and funding from a new national research effort to identify which healthcare services work best. The report also spells out actions and resources needed to ensure that this comparative effectiveness research initiative will be a sustained effort with a continuous process for updating priorities as needed and that the results are put into clinical practice.

A committee convened by the IOM developed the list of priority topics at the request of Congress as part of a $1.1 billion effort to improve the quality and efficiency of health care through comparative effectiveness research outlined in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The committee's report provides independent guidance—informed by extensive public input—to Congress and the secretary of HHS on how to spend $400 million on research to compare health services and approaches to care.

Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest private employer, sent a letter to President Obama and congressional officials expressing support for an employer mandate that would require large companies to provide health insurance to their workers. As reported by Kaiser Health News and the Associated Press, Wal-Mart’s chief executive, Michael Duke, was joined in signing the letter by Andrew L. Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union, which represents more than a million healthcare workers, and John Podesta, who leads the Center for American Progress. The letter also states that any employer mandate should be balanced by a healthcare cost containment guarantee, perhaps through a trigger mechanism that would impose reductions if designated spending targets were not met.