Category: Health Reform

About 1 in 6 Emergency Visits and Hospital Stays Had At Least One Out-of-Network Charge in 2017

In roughly 1 of every 6 emergency room visits and inpatient hospital stays in 2017, patients came home with at least one out-of-network medical bill, a new KFF analysis finds. More specifically, 18 percent of all emergency visits and 16 percent of in-n…

An Examination of Surprise Medical Bills and Proposals to Protect Consumers from Them

This analysis examines how often patients get hit with surprise medical bills, what circumstances tend to give rise to them and what proposals are being considered to protect consumers from this problem. The study of claims data from large employer hea…

KFF Health Tracking Poll – June 2019: Health Care in the Democratic Primary and Medicare-for-all

In anticipation of upcoming Democratic presidential debates, this poll finds that Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents say that health care is a top issue they want to hear candidates talk about. When asked to say in their own words what healt…

Poll: Most Americans Don’t Realize How Dramatically the Medicare-for-all Proposals Would Revamp the Nation’s Health Care System

As Congress and the Democratic presidential candidates continue to discuss Medicare-for-all and other proposals to expand public health coverage, most Americans know little about how the leading Medicare-for-all proposals would reshape the way all Amer…

Visualizing Health Policy: Barriers to Care Experienced by Women in the United States 

This Visualizing Health Policy infographic looks at barriers to care experienced by women in the United States. Women incur greater health care costs than men, particularly during the reproductive years. Despite a lower uninsured rate than men (11% vs …

Visualizing Health Policy: Barriers to Care Experienced by Women in the United States

This Visualizing Health Policy infographic, produced in partnership with the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), looks at barriers to care experienced by women in the United States.

Voters Are Tuning Out the Health Care Debates

In this Axios column, Drew Altman reports on new KFF focus groups with voters. They show voters are focused on the problems they have paying for care and navigating the health system, but have yet to tune in on the health proposals being made by candid…

Tracking Section 1332 State Innovation Waivers

This interactive map shows the status of all Section 1332 waivers requested by states. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) allows states to apply for innovation waivers to alter key ACA requirements in the individual and small group insurance markets and can…

Tracking Section 1332 State Innovation Waivers

This interactive map shows the status of all Section 1332 waivers requested by states. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) allows states to apply for innovation waivers to alter key ACA requirements in the individual and small group insurance markets and can…

The silent affordability crisis facing sick people

In this Axios column, Drew Altman shows that employer coverage for lower wage workers is much worse than ACA marketplace coverage for similar populations. It’s a bigger problem we need to talk about more, he says.