Capacity Building

Two years after the main Affordable Care Act expansions were implemented and almost six years after it became law, we’ve re-designed our CT Health Reform Dashboard to reflect the changing challenges and opportunities. Most of the 125 tasks and decision points in the original progress meter have been set in place. New opportunities to reform…

A new Health Affairs blog highlights the benefits of learning trips for state health policymakers working on systemic change. The author, President of New Jersey’s Nicholson Foundation, notes that out-of-state trips are very effective in fostering new perspectives on problems and finding innovative solutions. “The Nicholson Foundation is dedicated to addressing the complex needs of…

Among the many important provisions in SB-811, is Section 17 directing the state Health Care Cabinet to conduct a study of successful payment reform models from other states. The Cabinet is to report back to the General Assembly with recommendations for policy changes that will provide a framework to control health care costs, reward value-based…

A CT Mirror Op-Ed describes the challenges facing CSCU students who tried to testify at the Appropriations Committee hearing on the Governor’s budget. Insiders forget how unfriendly the process is, even for organized students supported by their professors. Hopefully they don’t give up.

The gap between science literacy and science awareness prompted two Yale infectious disease and immunology grad students to start Because Science, a new blog that makes science easy to understand for non-scientists. Science news can be scary if context and nuances aren’t included. With the blog, they want to de-mystify scientific concepts and promote science.They’ve…

A lot happened in health care in CT this year — a lot of promising projects but some opportunities lost as well, leaving lots of uncertainty for 2015. It’s never boring.      Thankfully, health care costs held stable   CT seems to be following the US trend of slowing health costs. Spending per person in Medicaid…

To keep up on the latest in CT’s health care landscape, sign up for our (mostly) every-other-week newsletter, CT Health Notes. You can also search our archives that go back fifteen years. For a reminder of how far CT has come, our first CT Health Notes edition from January 2001 included an invitation to our…

CT-N, Connecticut’s Network, has produced ADVOCACY: Turning the Gears of Democracy — short, easy-to-understand videos on how to advocate effectively. The four videos cover what advocacy is and why it is so important, your right to advocate, effective strategies and how to engage the media to amplify your voice. The videos are exceptional tools for…

Slides and the syllabus from a Fall graduate public policy class at Trinity College are online. The course, Implementing ObamaCare in CT, is tracking how the Affordable Care Act is unfolding in our state. Class topics for the class so far include ACA 2.0/CT context, health insurance exchange, Medicaid, insurance reform, workforce/providers, public health, health…