Archive for July 2009

The bad news is that only 165 people having signed up for PCCM – now called HUSKY Primary Care, according to DSS at yesterday’s PCCM Subcommittee meeting. The dept. is spending a lot of time with a small number of providers developing care management plans, procedures, comparison charts, etc. A three page notice about PCCM…

Today’s Hartford Courant online poll is again on health care. Should Congress tax the wealthy to pay for reform?

If we don’t address our broken health care system, 16,220 more CT residents this year will join the 326,000 already uninsured in our state, according to a new report by Families USA. Between the beginning of 2008 and the end of 2010 it is estimated that 48,660 more CT residents will lose coverage if nothing…

According to the Wall Street Journal blog, some 11 and 12 year old children in East London participating in a study on exercise and obesity clipped their pedometers to their dogs to raise their results. The use of pedometers was designed to get around study subjects’ natural tendencies to over-report how much they exercise.

Why were CEOs of large tobacco companies willing to testify under oath that nicotine is not addictive? Why might a patient with a sore knee be more likely to receive an MRI exam if he has conventional health insurance than if he belongs to an HMO? Why do physicians tend to overprescribe antibiotics? Through questions,…

Debate: Was Governor Rell right to veto the uninversal health care bill?Record your opinion – vote today.

The American Lung Association has a new online scorecard of air quality across the US. Every county in CT gets an F for high ozone days. Litchfield and New London get C’s for particle pollution but Fairfield, Hartford and New Haven get an F on that measure as well. High levels of ozone and particle…

According to DSS at today’s Medicaid Managed Care Council, the number of dental providers participating in the CT Dental Partnership grew by 20.8% from December to June. There are now 924 dental providers at 541 locations across the state caring for HUSKY and SAGA consumers. DSS also reported that there were only 366 HUSKY appeals…

Today’s Buzz poll at the Hartford Courant website: Was Governor Rell right to veto health care bills?

It’s Too Hard to be Sick in America: Stories of Chronic Illness is new by CT’s own Jennifer Jaff, Executive Director of Advocacy for Patients with Chronic Illness. The book details the stories of people struggling with long term illness, including Jennifer’s own story. No statistics, no analysis and no political spinning can make the…