Kaiser Health News, Cost & Quality Blog

Ballad Health, the only hospital system across a large swath of Tennessee and Virginia, has fallen short of quality-of-care and charity care obligations — even as it’s sued thousands of patients for unpaid bills.

The White House said the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will develop new regulations that would prevent unpaid medical bills from being counted on credit reports.

After decades of unchecked mergers, health care is the land of giants, with huge medical systems monopolizing care in many cities, states, and even whole regions of the country. This decreases patient choice, impedes innovation, erodes quality of care, and raises prices. And federal regulators have been slow to act.

Each year, Medicare punishes hospitals that have high rates of readmissions and high rates of infections and patient injuries. Check out which hospitals have been penalized.

The Vermont senator sees beefing up the primary care workforce as a critical step in expanding Americans’ access to health care.

Consumers should know that this type of fraud can happen, whether from a large-scale breach or theft of an individual’s data. The result could be thousands of dollars in medical bills.

When Medi-Cal beneficiary Lloyd Tennison moved last year from Contra Costa County to San Joaquin County, he was bumped off his managed care plan without notice before his new coverage took effect. His case highlights a chronic issue in California’s fragmented Medicaid program.