The Affordable Health Care Act

Primary care in the United States has been in a state of neglect or of being underfunded for a long time. This dysfunctional state has been allowed to occur despite evidence, which shows the importance of primary care in creating healthy outcomes and controlling costs. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) tries to address some of these issues by:

Many people throughout the United States (US) have some form of chronic disease. Chronic diseases are conditions that are not passed from person to person (noncommunicable), have a long duration, are commonly slow in progression, and generally have no cure (World Health Organization (WHO), n.d.b). Currently, chronic diseases are the leading cause of disability and death in the US and about half of all adults have at least one chronic illness (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2016b). This means that nearly every person in the US will be affected by chronic conditions whether it be personally or through loved ones having these diseases. The most prevalent types of chronic

Not only has the cases of preventable chronic diseases increased over the years affecting half of the U.S population, they account for 86% of the health care costs. Programs and policies that address risk factors and causes of these diseases at their roots would not only promote public health but reduce the cost of health care both in treatment and hospitalization.

I believed that alcohol consumption, smoking and being overweight could lead to “cardiovascular disease…cancer, [and] obesity” (CAN, 2005, p. 5). Furthermore, those behaviours cause a large cost for society to extend the health care costs for these patients as being overweight and smoking had the largest impact on the health care utilization (Vals, Kiivet, & Leinsalu, 2013, p. 1).

The Affordable Care Act was implemented in March 2010 states several new requirements that not for profit hospitals organizations must meet to be compliant for tax exemption. The Internal Revenue Service developed new forms and guides to help implement the new section of Affordable Care Act. The requirements are listed under the Internal Revenue Code (IRC) Section 501(C)(3). This section affects not for profit organizations that operate one or more hospital organization and states four requirements that the organizations must meet at each facility they operate. The four requirements stated by the Internal Revenue Services (IRS) under the ACA are the following;

The goal of this policy brief is to support Alabama’s current decision to continue Medicaid Primary Care Parity, as first enacted by congress in 2010 to all states under section 1202 of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). However, as Alabama is facing budget cuts to its Medicaid services, supporting the “Ensuring Access to Primary Care for Women and Children Act” will extend federally funded Medicaid primary care parity without harming the state budget and negate the consequences of limiting Medicaid enrollee access and benefits. The federal government proposed to pay 100% of Medicaid services mandated under section 1202, from 2013 to 2014, which has since expired in December 2014. This program requires certain primary care services to be reimbursed at higher rates equivalent to those rates paid by Medicare for equivalent primary care services. Limited provider participation, limited Medicaid beneficiary access & decreased enrollment of physicians, physician assistants (PAs) and nurse practitioners (NPs) into primary care can be improved through this monetary incentive.

Primary care access is a growing concern for all Americans and the reason behind this concern is an imbalance between demand for care and capacity to provide care. Demand is growing as the population expands, ages, and faces chronic illnesses and the capacity is shrinking as the ration of primary care clinicians to population drops (Ghorob & Bodenheimer, 2012). A primary goal of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was to improve access to quality health care for uninsured Americans, largely through public and private insurance expansions (Polsky et al, 2015). At the same time, the architects of the law recognized the need to increase the availability of primary care providers to meet the increased demand for health care (Pg. 538, 2015).

The Obama Care bill also Known as the patient protect and Affordable Care Act was established on March 21, 2010. The Affordable healthcare Act also known as Obama Care has helped over a billion people gain access to health. In 2010 it shows that 50 million people in America did not have insurance, it also shows that 48.6 million people had decreased, and then it increased in 2012. In 2010, before the Healthcare Act was signed Obama noticed some of the small issues that were going on in healthcare systems. Obama seen that some of the insurance Companies had some unjustified rates for their healthcare plan. He observed how some of the prices for healthcare were controlled by hospitals and private doctors. The way that the healthcare system used to work was that the people that could afford the healthcare plans were able to get them. The People that were unable to get healthcare insurance like through their job or a private practice had to rely on getting Medicaid and Medicare was only for disable people or elderly people. The Affordable healthcare Act was placed to help people throughout the U.S. receive insurance even if they don’t qualify with their employer or private healthcare insurance. What many people do not know is that the new affordable care act offers many great benefits. Such as great benefits for women’s health, Birth control, people with preexisting conditions have great benefits, etc. Having this Affordable Act care will bring great benefits to our future and

The Affordable Care Act was signed into law in 2010, just over five years ago. Since then the healthcare industry, and even organizations outside the industry, have been affected in many ways; from new reimbursement models, opening healthcare exchanges, millions of individuals gaining insurance that they previously did not have, and a plethora of new regulations just to name a few. Although the law was passed in 2010, it wasn’t until 2014 that millions of newly insured participants entered into the system when much of the affects were initially recognized. However, even with two enrollment periods under our belt, a new enrollment period set to begin in a month, along with additional regulations still to be fully recognized, how the

Some states have accepted the terms of the program including all of its expansion on the health care system, but some have been reluctant to implement the program. One of those reluctant states has been Florida, which is apparent by multiple court cases that has come since its inception (1). With Florida’s House of Representative consisting of a majority of Republicans, the conservatives of the state have fought the incorporation of the bill (2). With legislative bodies in opposition of the terms of the Affordable Care Act, it begs to question how policy makers have approached the issue of healthcare. My research question was in what ways the Affordable Health Care Act has affected healthcare in Florida, and how effective has it been in

Total health care spending in 1975 consumed about 8 percent of the U.S economy in 1975. Today it accounts for nearly 16 percent of the gross domestic product and is projected to reach nearly 20 percent by 2016 (Orszag, 2007). One of the reasons for rising health care costs is due to costly new medical technologies. Some of these new medical advancements allow for physicians to treat previously untreatable conditions. It is unclear as to whether these new options are cost effective. Most people believe that more expensive care equates to better health care. There is significant evidence to support that more expensive care does not necessarily mean higher-quality care. This suggests that there may be an opportunity to reduce health care spending without impairing outcomes The most compelling evidence of that opportunity comes from the substantial geographic differences in spending on health care within the United States-and the fact that they do not translate into higher life expectancy or measured

Health care has been a prominent issue within the United States. The United States has made strides to make health care more affordable and accessible to all citizens. However, those strides are not enough to truly make health care obtainable for everyone. The Affordable Health Care Act was made to help make health care affordable for everyone so that everyone can receive the care they need. The Affordable Health Care Act (ACA) does not do its job in making health care affordable. It is essential that congressmen and women reform the ACA because it doesn’t go far enough in reforming health care itself and is doing more harm than good.

In today’s society health care has become a huge issue for most Americans who are financially struggling and who also live in poverty. Obama passed an act known as Obama Care, which is also called the Affordable Health Care Act. The ACA (Affordable Health Care Act) was implemented in order to provide affordable health insurance for those living in poverty and for those who cannot financially afford health care. It was set out to improve the lives of Americans with affordable health care and affordable health insurance for all (Obama Care facts). Due to the propaganda that was put into place with the ACA, a majority of American’s today only know the positive effects the ACA has on today’s society. The first thought that comes any

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) with the creation of the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) has sought out to provide health care providers and other organizations in the medical field, research and data to make better decisions about providing healthcare. These decisions are of course centered on patient-outcomes and cost effectiveness. Since the creation of the PCORI it has focused on very general topics in the medical field and may not address a large enough scope of issues before its reauthorization in 2019. The PCORI needs to focus on more specific and quickly effective issues to maintain its relevancy

Seven in ten deaths in the United States, are attributable to chronic disease (“Leading Causes” 1). These diseases are not on account of bacteria or viruses, which could be treated with an appropriate prescription or vaccine. Chronic conditions are developed through unhealthy lifestyles and behaviors such as a lack of exercise, poor nutrition, poor sleeping habits, and substance use (e.g. tobacco). Consequently, seven in ten of every death can be prevented with changes in lifestyle. The CDC states that these conditions, “are among the most common, costly, and preventable of all health problems” (“Chronic Disease” 1). Although these conditions have clear and definite causes (knowing the exact reason and “cure” for them), they are becoming more prevalent rather than domesticated. According to Wu and Green, “Between 2000 and 2030 the number of Americans with chronic conditions will increase by 37 percent, an increase of 46 million people” (1). This increase comes with an increase in health care costs: the CDC reported that the U.S. spent three trillion dollars on health care in 2014 (“Health Expenditures” 1). 86% of these costs was associated with these conditions (“Prevention” 1). Despite there being a range of causes of why patients make these choices, one issue that may be less familiar to others is the lack of knowledge in preventative medicine among health care professionals. Current training standards are not adequately educating or equipping health care professionals