research
Study finds Americans living in liberal states, like CT, live longer but we can do better
Recently, working-age Americans’ mortality has reversed its historic declines, largely due to lack of progress on heart disease, and rising deaths due to alcohol, suicide, and drug poisoning. A new study finds that from 1999 to 2019, mortality for adults ages 25-64 was lower in states with liberal policies, like Connecticut, and worse in conservative…
Read MoreBest kept secret: You now have free access to all your medical records
As of last Thursday, under new federal rules, healthcare organizations must give patients timely access to all their medical records in digital format without cost. This reverses the usual practice that only gave patients costly access to just some of their data, while data brokers profited by selling deidentified data and analysis to drug companies,…
Read MoreNumber of uninsured CT residents continues down despite COVID
Download the report The latest numbers from the US Census on US health coverage last year find that there were 184,000 uninsured Connecticut residents (5.2%) in 2021, down 23,000 from 2019 (at 5.9%). Both years were far below 2013, before implementation of the Affordable Care Act, when 333,000 or 9.4% of state residents were uninsured.…
Read MorePrimary care spending boost and capitation didn’t work in private plans either
The big idea circulating in some CT health policy circles to control the costs of healthcare is to boost primary care with tons of money and capitate provider payments. Primary care is regular health care for prevention, like check-ups, and common health problems. A new study finds that the idea failed in private insurance, as…
Read MoreBook Club: Making Numbers Count
If your job is to communicate policy and make sense of it, you need Making Numbers Count – The Art and Science of Communicating Numbers by Chip Health and Karla Starr. Numbers are the bedrock of policy (or they should be) but they are scary to 99.9% of people – including the people you need…
Read MoreOP-ED: Be careful in making changes when the glass is half full
There is good news on Connecticut health spending – and we can use it. Analysis of new data has found, not surprisingly, that Connecticut residents spend a lot on healthcare. But the good news is that our average annual rate of growth, at 1.8%, was the ninth lowest among states from 2013 to 2019. We…
Read MoreGood news on CT healthcare costs
New data from researchers at the University of Washington on state per person healthcare spending finds that between 2013 and 2019, Connecticut’s costs grew at the ninth lowest level among states. We dropped from seventh highest in the US in 2014 to eleventh in 2019. Our growth rate was lower than nearby comparator states and…
Read MoreAnother gift from COVID – CT life expectancy dropped 1.9 years in 2020
In 2020, Connecticut life expectancy at birth dropped to 78.4 years, down 1.9 years from 2019, according to a new CDC report. Life expectancy dropped in all states. Any drop is awful, but Connecticut’s metric is still tenth best in the nation, behind Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont. New York had the largest drop in…
Read MoreCTNJ Analysis: Another CT healthcare story of wasted money and missed opportunities
An excellent investigative piece by C-HIT published Tuesday found that the state Office of Health Strategy has squandered $20 million in federal funds and delayed for years a key health improvement system that could be protecting our health today. The C-HIT investigation took the better part of a year, encountered serious roadblocks from OHS, and…
Read MoreCT is 24th in public health funding
Connecticut has a chronic problem with underfunding public health. We aren’t alone, but we’ve done little to fix the problem. The pandemic should’ve made crystal clear the value of a strong public health surveillance and response system. Like all prevention, we have to fund it before we need it. In 2021, Connecticut ranked 24th in…
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