By Marilyn M. Singleton, MD, JD Have we lost our collective minds? A mass shooting with no readily apparent motive is an extreme representation of our sense that our social fabric is unraveling. This is one of those things that people don’t believe can happen until it happens. And despite the unspeakable tragedy, it took […]
By Marilyn M. Singleton, M.D., J.D. California’s state senate’s unipartisan passing of a sweeping single-payer health care bill, the Healthy California Act, has drawn attention to single payer as a solution to the decaying Affordable Care Act. The ACA decreased competition and plan availability in health insurance and leaves patients holding the bag of unaffordable […]
In this edition of Legislative Update, Marilyn Singleton, MD, JD dissects AHCA. We know what’s in the House version, but what will the Senate come up with? The American Health Care Act, H.R. 1628—passed by the House with one vote to spare on May 4—is a budget reconciliation bill that is part of the 2017 […]
“Beware of the Ides of March as both parties slowly kill us all off!” ~Marilyn Singleton, MD, JD reports on the latest battles in health care legislation on Capitol Hill. Revisions to the ACA Revisions to the ACA continued to pile in even as the “repeal and replace” was in progress. What was on their […]
By Marilyn M. Singleton, MD, JD As I physician, I proudly recited and adhere to the Oath of Hippocrates, which commands physicians to “use treatment to help the sick according to [their] ability and judgment … and [to] abstain from all intentional wrong-doing and harm.” Physicians don’t all think alike—medically or politically—but when a patient’s […]
As we enter the second month of the 115th Congress, Marilyn Singleton, MD, JD is out with her review of the latest medical care related proposals on Capitol Hill, from full ACA repeal to Medicare for all and everything in between. Full Repeal of the Affordable Care Act On January 9, 2017, H.R. 370, […]
Marilyn Singleton, MD, JD is back with her first legislative update for the 115th Congress. The 115th United States Congress has convened with the introduction of numerous health care bills. Most bills we looked at last year have “died in a previous Congress.” Bills are not carried forward from Congress to Congress. They have two years to make […]
by Marilyn M. Singleton, M.D., J.D. Senior citizens, don’t be fooled. The federal government asserts that Medicare sets a high bar for medical care and we are lucky to have it. Not so. It does, however, claim a virtual monopoly on health insurance coverage for all eligible persons. All citizens who receive Social Security or […]
By Marilyn Singleton, MD, JD: The goal of the recent sometimes-unruly protests over the election of Donald Trump as the 45th president of the United States of America is unclear. Is it to make President-elect Trump preemptively resign? Is it to ensure that he never takes office—by any means necessary? Is it to exercise the […]
by Marilyn M. Singleton, M.D., J.D. These days, in order to keep costs down the vast majority of insurance plans use the model that limits the hospitals or physicians from whom patients can get medical services. The “covered services” are determined by the insurer. The plans involve contracts between the insurer and the patient, and […]