Health

The plan to restructure the state's HUSKY health insurance program was hailed as a way to improve services and save millions of dollars. But two months into the budget year, the agency in charge of HUSKY has not made the change, and has raised questions about the benefits and savings to be achieved. Read more

People with diabetes make up less than 8 percent of the population, but they represented nearly 20 percent of U.S. hospitalizations in 2008, a new report says. Read more

Emergency department visits are increasing in Connecticut and across the country, and doctors say they are likely to become even busier as health reform rolls out.

While many discussions of the health care system have focused on people without insurance crowding emergency rooms, research suggests that much of the traffic comes instead from people with Medicaid, a public insurance plan. And that points to an impending problem: The federal health reform law relies heavily on Medicaid to expand health insurance coverage to millions of Americans. Read more

Congress was debating health reform this spring when the line began forming in Middletown. Hundreds of people waited hours, some overnight, for a free visit with a dentist.

Ten days later, the reform bill became law, putting 32 million uninsured Americans on a path to receive health coverage.

But for adults without dental insurance, like the 2,000 who waited at the clinic in March, the health reform law offers little chance of improvement. Read more

More than three-quarters of Connecticut hospitals posted a positive total margin during the 2009 fiscal year, a reversal from the previous year, when fewer than half did, according to a report released by the state Office of Health Care Access.

But those figures might not indicate a smooth future for Connecticut hospitals. Read more

WASHINGTON-When Anthem Blue Cross tried to raise health insurance premiums in California by 39 percent this year, the move became a rallying point for proponents of health care reform legislation, and the landmark bill won final passage soon after.

So what will the health care reform bill actually do about double-digit premium hikes?

The answer to that question is still being sorted out, as insurance companies, health care providers, and consumer groups engage in a new tug-of-war over how federal regulators implement the law's provisions on premium increases. Read more

WASHINGTON-Congress has squashed hopes for a $10 billion rescue fund to save teacher jobs. Emergency Medicaid funding for the states is teetering on a political cliff. And the talk of extending health insurance subsidies for laid-off workers has gone quiet.

As Congress inches toward a five-week August recess without passing any of these funding measures, public officials in Connecticut are growing increasingly jittery about the financial fall-out at home. Read more

Gov. M. Jodi Rell announced Monday that the state will move forward to set up its own insurance plan for people with serious health problems, instead of letting the federal government run the program.

The decision clears the way for people with pre-existing conditions to begin applying for health insurance--but it comes after a last-minute reassessment that put Connecticut a month behind many other state in offering the coverage. Read more

The state's largest health care workers union called on Gov. M. Jodi Rell this morning to intervene in its three-month-long strike against the Vernon-based owner of six Connecticut nursing homes.

About 100 members of New England Health Care Employees Union, District 1199, picketed for an hour today outside of the governor's residence on Prospect Street in Hartford, chanting "Governor Rell, hear our plea: help protect the elderly." Read more