Word: hmos
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...doctors say they also want to take better care of patients. Prying more money out of HMOs for treatment is one way. Another is to insist that HMO contracts let doctors make all the decisions on treatment rather than allowing "M.B.A.s phoning from the back of their limos to cancel bone-marrow transplants for breast-cancer patients," as one medical researcher puts...
...doctors face some obstacles. One is the formation of organizations big enough to force HMOs to deal with them--or even to raise enough money to get going. Still, the doctors potentially have mighty muscle: without them, HMOs can't exist...
...premiums into care. The United Automobile Workers and General Motors have launched pilot projects to work with hospitals and doctor groups to bring down the proportion of premium dollars going to administrative costs. In Flint, Michigan, they got hospitals to eliminate 450 unneeded beds so that more money from HMOs will go to care for patients in the beds that will be kept...
...lead: 75% of its insured citizens are in managed-care plans, more than in any other state. Health Access, a coalition of 215 consumer organizations, is drafting a very comprehensive state bill of rights for HMO members. It would set legal standards on everything from when HMOs can deny care to how long they can keep patients waiting on the telephone...
...coalition is apparently heartened rather than daunted by the fate of two propositions to regulate HMOs that appeared on last November's ballot. Both lost but drew about 40% of the vote--even though supporters of one measure were outspent nearly 50 to 1 by their foes. The more restrictive of the two measures, significantly, was drafted largely by the California Nurses Association. Nurses fear that HMOs want to squeeze them out of many jobs and replace them with low-paid technicians...