TODAY MARKS THE Affordable Care Act’s 13th birthday since its signing by President Obama on March 23, 2020, a landmark moment that our current president famously noted at the time with colorful zeal. Massachusetts has particular reason to take note of today’s anniversary, as our 2006 universal health insurance law was among the ACA’s most important […]
John E. McDonough
Posted inOpinion
DPH gets it right on Mass General Brigham
THE LONG-RUNNING power struggle between Mass General Brigham, the state’s largest health and hospital system, and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts took a decisive turn this past week. Department of Public Health regulators unveiled their recommendations regarding Mass General Brigham’s expansion proposal that involves five sites and facilities across Greater Boston. The hospital system filed three […]
Posted inOpinion
Moment of truth for state’s health cost benchmark
A MOMENT OF TRUTH is now here for Mass General Brigham, as well as for the Massachusetts Health Policy Commission, the Department of Public Health, and for health insurance premium payers across the state. The immediate issue coming to a head by March is whether DPH will allow Mass General Brigham to further expand its […]
Posted inOpinion, Politics
2 takes on how to protect our health and democracy
Push back deadlines and reduce signature requirements By John E. McDonough, Paul Hattis, and David K. Jones The ongoing COVID-19 global epidemic is having an unexpected negative impact on our state’s democracy. Many political campaigns across the Commonwealth and the nation have suspended activities. State leaders need to take immediate action to ensure that the […]
Posted inHealth Care
On health performance, Mass. not such a shiny star
MANY BAY STATE health care cognoscenti and politicos like to brag about Massachusetts health statistics. For years now, Massachusetts has performed well, at or near the top, in surveys of key health indicators among the 50 US states. For example, the United Health Foundation’s 2016 America’s Health Rankings had Massachusetts in 1st place (though we […]
Posted inOpinion
Why we’re voting no on Question 1
SHOULD MASSACHUSETTS establish mandated nurse-to-patient ratios in law for all the state’s acute care hospitals? This 25-year-old conflict between the Massachusetts Nurses Association and Massachusetts Hospital Association will be determined at the polls on November 6 as Question 1. We think not. We are university professors who care about Massachusetts health care policy. We both […]
Posted inHealth Care
Time for Baker to step up on health care
FOR THE BETTER part of this decade, Massachusetts had been on a roll regarding its health system’s performance. Since passage of the 2006 universal health insurance law, we’ve been tops in having the lowest number of uninsured the nation. Recent national surveys on cost, quality, access, and public health from the Commonwealth Fund, the United […]
Posted inOpinion
We need CBO-like scoring of state health care bills
WHEN I WAS A MEMBER of the Massachusetts House of Representatives back in the 1990s, I learned about the concept of continuous quality improvement, or CQI, as a way to improve any process – including medical care – using a rigorous data driven approach. CQI seemed good to me and a natural fit in my […]
Posted inHealth Care
An upstart helps to reshape MassHealth
ON MARCH 1, the state’s Medicaid program—known as MassHealth—entered a new era with the launch of 17 accountable care organizations, or ACOs, aiming to provide better coordinated care at lower costs to its low-income enrollees. It’s an ambitious effort with lots of risk and big potential rewards. Within this is another compelling effort to redefine […]
Posted inOpinion
Silver linings and seeds in tax cut law – Part II
This is the second part of John McDonough’s “Silver Linings Playbook.” Read the first installment here. THE AMERICAN AUTHOR Napoleon Hill wrote: “Every adversity has the seed of an equivalent or greater benefit.” I see this happen in health policy, and specifically, I see it in how the Republican tax cut law signed by President Trump […]