The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "HMO" ...
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"Bed Check: HMO Rates Hospitals; Many Don't Like It, But They Get Better"
Burton looks at a study of cardiac units in Ohio hospitals by Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield. Surprisingly, he says, the study's rankings show a relatively unknown hospital to have the best care for heart surgery patients, while the more famous clinics don't score so well. He traces the fallout from the study's announcements.
Tags: Anthem; Blue Cross; Blue Shield; cardiac; heart; rankings; mortality; nurse; doctor; surgery; surgeon; Ohio State; St. Elizabeth
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Boutique Medicine: For the right price, these doctors treat patients as precious. Their 'consultancy' signals rise of a system critics say favors the wealthy. Practicing HMO-avoidance.
This story explains how the, "...Seattle Medical Associates is an unusual medical consultancy, where people pay for a doctor's know-how. For a range of fees, patients get unlimited access to a doctor they know who will guide them through the maze of hospitals and medical specialists they may encounter if they do get sick."
Tags: doctors; Seattle Medical Associates; medicine; doctor; doctor on call; medical specialists; hospitals; medical specialists
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Looking After Managed Care
Governing reports that "as more and more states convert their Medicaid populations to managed care plans, they must guard themselves against unseemly and even illegal practices." The story provides examples of such unseemly and illegal practices.
Tags: welfare; human services; state government; HMO; insurance; public aid
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The Doctor is Out
Sickened by the shift to managed care, more physicians are claiming disability, moving into administration or leaving medicine altogether.
Tags: managed care; physicians; HMO
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The Soul of an HMO
Times magazine reports how "managed care is bringing sown America's medical costs, but it is also raising the questions of whether patients, especially those with severe illnesses, can still trust their doctors."
Tags: doctors; illness; HMO; patient care; medical costs; sickness
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The HMO Laid Low
Two-thirds of managed care companies are losing money. When they get in trouble, states often get in trouble as well.
Tags: HMO; Consumer Assistance plan; Florida; insurance; health
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There when you need it
U.S. News ranks 271 of the nation's HMOs and looks at an innovator that stresses preventive medicine.
Tags: HMO; ranking; preventive medicine
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Ten Things Your HMO Won't Tell You
SmartMoney magazine reports on the most common ways in which HMO companies can and do hurt their customers. Some of these are: the less your doctor sees you, the more he earns; Your primary-care doctor is your specialist; your health is a numbers game to us; Our exclusions could kill you; you are not sick until we tell you're sick; your ignorance is our bliss; we're loose with the facts; we use second-rate parts; Send you to an expensive therapist? are you crazy?; unhappy? go ahead, just try to sue us.
Tags: HMO; health insurance; patient care.
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The Death of Family Health Plan: Was it a victim of competition? Or did management changes, regulatory loopholes and bad information contribute to its demise?
Gunn charts the demise of Family Health Plan, a Wisconsin HMO. This demise "was a remarkable meltdown of a once well-established, even venerable player in the local health-insurance marketplace...The insurer was a casualty of the massive changes that have swept through the health-care and health-insurance industries, and of the wholesale turnover of the insurer's top management during the course of those changes."
Tags: family health plan; managed care; managed health care; health maintenance organization; HMO; Wisconsin Office of the Commissioner of Insurance
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Swiss Miss: When his wife required an emergency transplant, this professor was willing to donate his own kidney -- but CU wasn't willing to pay the price.
Westword recounts the wrangling between the University of Colorado and CU professor Victor Saouma over the cost of an emergency kidney transplant in Switzerland for Saouma's wife, Rhea. The Saoumas were enrolled in CU's employee health plan, which provided health care through the university's Health Sciences Center. The Saoumas had also purchased the Silver Plan, additional coverage that allowed them to get some treatment outside of CU. But with enrollment in this plan dropping and its costs increasing, CU officials dropped the plan altogether. The new plan, called the Gold Plan, did not allow for transplants outside of the Health Sciences Center except in the most urgent of cases. CU tried to avoid paying for the cost of Rhea's kidney transplant while the couple was living in Switzerland for Victor's sabbatical. After being served a lawsuit in the fall of 2000, CU administrators eventually agreed to pay the costs of the surgery, plus interest, legal fees and an additional, undisclosed amount. A 1999 audit of CU's employee health program validated allegations that the plan was mismanaged.
Tags: University of Colorado; organ transplant; health maintenance organization; HMO; university health plan