New Health Updates

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Medicare & The New Health Care Law - What it Means for You

Medicare beneficiaries will soon receive information in the mail about the immediate benefits they may see from the new the Affordable Care Act. The first benefit that several million Medicare beneficiaries will receive is a one-time check for $250, if they enter the Part D donut hole and are not eligible for Medicare Extra Help. The donut hole, or coverage gap, is the period in the prescription drug benefit in which a beneficiary pays 100 percent of the cost of their drugs until they hit the catastrophic coverage. Next year, all beneficiaries who enter the gap will get a 50 percent discount for covered brand name Part D drugs. Also beginning next year, Medicare beneficiaries will get preventive care services like colorectal cancer screening and mammograms without cost-sharing, in addition to an annual wellness visit. A fact sheet about Medicare and the new health care law is available in English and Spanish.

To see the article in full.

For more information.

HHS Publishes Health Care Reform Web Portal Requirements

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is creating a web portal to guide individuals and small businesses to identify health insurance coverage options within their state. The first phase of the web portal will be live on July 1, 2010, and will provide information on coverage options by state and zip code in the private market and information about public programs with links to more detailed information. The interim final rule adopts the categories of information that will be collected and displayed via the web site, and the data required from issuers and requested from states, associations, and high-risk pools in order to create this content. The comment period ends on June 4, 2010.

For more information.

he Affordable Care Act

The Affordable Care Act Gives Americans with Disabilities greater control over their own health care and includes much greater choices

• Expands the Medicaid Program
• Eligibility up to 133% of Poverty Level in 2014
• Those up to 400% of Poverty Level will be eligible for tax credits to purchase private insurance
• Expands the Medicaid program to more Americans, including people with disabilities.
• New Options for Long-Term Supports and Services
• Provides a new, voluntary, self-insured insurance program (CLASS Act) that helps families pay for the costs of long-term supports and services if a loved one develops a disability.
• Creates new options for states to provide home and community based services in Medicaid, enabling more people with disabilities to access long-term services in the setting they choose.
• Extends the Money Follows the Person program and makes improvements to the Medicaid Home- and Community-Based Services (HCBS) option.
• Eliminates Insurance Company Discrimination
• Eliminates pre-existing conditions in 2014
• This year, prohibits insurance companies from denying children coverage based on pre-existing conditions.
• Going forward, the Act will prohibit insurance companies from denying coverage or charging more to any person based on their medical history, including genetic information.
• This year, provides access to affordable insurance for uninsured Americans with pre-existing conditions through a temporary, subsidized high-risk pool, which will help protect them from medical bankruptcy.
• This high risk pool is a stop-gap measure that will serve as a bridge to a reformed health insurance marketplace.

More Affordable Choices and Competition

• Creates state-based health insurance Exchanges to provide families with the same private insurance choices that the President and Members of Congress will have, including multi-state plans to foster competition and increase consumer choice.
• One-Stop Shopping
• Provides standardized, easy-to-understand information through the Exchange on different health insurance plans so Americans can easily compare health plans to choose the quality, affordable option that is right for them.
• Insurance Security
• Ensures that families always have guaranteed choices of quality, affordable health insurance whether they lose their job, switch jobs, move, or get sick, through creation of Exchanges.
• Makes Health Care Accessible to Everyone
• Provides access to health insurance through Exchanges to those without job-based coverage and provides premium tax credits to those who can’t afford coverage, significantly increasing access to a choice of health insurance plans for individuals with disabilities. This will enable individuals to keep their jobs rather than giving up employment in order to receive Medicaid benefits.

Lowering Costs by Rewarding Quality and Cutting Waste

• Insurance Industry Reforms that Save Money
• This year, eliminates all lifetime limits on how much insurance companies cover if beneficiaries get sick and bans insurance companies from dropping people from coverage when they get sick.
• The Act also restricts the use of annual limits in all new plans and existing employer plans this year, until 2014 when all annual limits are prohibited.
• Going forward, plans in the new Health Insurance Exchanges and all new plans will have a cap on what insurance companies can require beneficiaries to pay in out-of-pocket expenses, such as co-pays and deductibles.
• Supports States starting in plan year 2011 in requiring health insurance companies to submit justification for requested premium increases, and insurance companies with excessive or unjustified premium exchanges may not be able to participate in the new Exchanges.
• Cracks down on excessive insurance overhead starting in 2011 by applying standards to how much insurance companies can spend on non-medical costs, such as bureaucracy, executive salaries, and marketing, and provides consumers a rebate if non-medical costs are too high.

Assuring Accessible, Quality, Affordable Health Care for People with Disabilities

• Preventive Care for Better Health
• This year, requires new plans to cover prevention and wellness benefits at no charge to American families by exempting these benefits from deductibles and other cost-sharing requirements.
• Invests in prevention and public health to encourage innovations in health care that prevent illness and disease before they require more costly treatment. People with disabilities are less likely to receive preventive care and are more likely to be diagnosed with screenable cancers at a later stage.
• Improves access to medical diagnostic equipment so people with disabilities can receive routine preventive care.

Addresses Health Disparities

• Moves toward eliminating disparities by improving data collection on health disparities for individuals with disabilities and improving training of health providers.
• Improve Care for Chronic Disease
• Invests in innovations such as medical homes and care coordination demonstrations in Medicare and Medicaid to prevent disabilities from occurring and progressing and to assist one in every 10 Americans who experience a major limitation in activity because of a chronic condition.

The United States Department of Health and Human Services has set up a website for people to become better informed about the health care legislation changes that are coming and to ask questions or get updates as the changes are implemented. If you want to become part of the discussion or get your questions answered: please take advantage of the resources below from the HHS Healthreform.gov website.

HHS Website: www.healthreform.gov

Affordable Care Act Provides Expanded Tax Benefit to Health Professionals Working in Underserved Areas

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has announced a change in the Affordable Care Act that now gives tax breaks to health care professionals who work in underserved communities on their 2009 and future federal income tax returns. This is an expansion to the tax exclusion for student loan forgiveness. On this IRS site, find out who is eligible, how to file or refile a corrected 2009 return to get this refund.

www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=224387,00.html

For more information on Healthcare Professional Resources from Disability.gov visit this link: www.disability.gov/health.

Contact the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to get your questions answered

Email your questions in to Healthreform@hhs.gov. They will try to answer as many as possible during live web chats and will answer more via the Your Questions Answered section on the HHS website.

Get involved in the discussion!

Join us live on www.facebook.com/whitehouse to ask questions, share your thoughts, voice concerns, or find out the schedule for the next Online Chat.

July 2010

Disability Related Events in New York To locate disability related events in New York State for September 8th 2010 through October 7th 2010, click the region link or click the region in the map below.
	Broome
	Capital District
	Central New York
	Finger Lakes
	Hudson Valley
	Long Island
	New York City
	SunMount
	Taconic
	Western New York
Want us to list Your Event?   If your government or non-for-profit organization is holding a disability-related event in New York State between October 8th, 2010 and December 7th, 2010 and you would like us to list it in the Monthly Update, you can submit the information online with the Monthly Update Event Submission Page.