June 22, 2022: Health Equity or Private Equity?

 

Is Wall Street Taking Over Health Care for Seniors?

In 2020, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) launched a new model program that has moved millions of traditional Medicare beneficiaries into mostly commercial, for-profit plans called Direct Contracting Entities (DCE), without the enrollees’ full understanding or consent.

Under the Biden administration, this program was renamed REACH. Our community hospital, Peace Health, is now operating a Direct Contracting Entity.

What will this mean to your medical costs? What does it mean to your choice of doctors and more importantly, what will it mean to the Medicare System?

Our speaker, Dr. Ana Malinow, explains the new system and answer your questions.

Ana Malinow, MD, MSHCPM, FAAPDr. Ana Malinow is a professor of pediatrics at the University of California-San Francisco. She was previously associate residency program director at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC. Prior to moving to Pittsburgh, she was associate professor of pediatrics at Baylor College of Medicine and attending physician in the pediatric emergency and ambulatory center at Ben Taub General Hospital, where most of her patients were uninsured.

Dr. Malinow is the recipient of numerous teaching awards, including for grand rounds presentations on health care. She was named one of Houston’s top female physicians by Health and Fitness Sports Magazine.

Dr. Malinow is a past president of Physicians for a National Health Program and co-founder of Health Care for all Texas, a grassroots organization that promotes single-payer national health insurance. She is also co-founder of Doctors for Change, an organization of health care professionals that organize for improved access to health care in Houston and Harris county.