Launches innovative online pilot program to help people with insurance needs better navigate the health care system

Menlo Park, California- change:healthcare and HSA Living™ Insurance Services, LLC, (www.hsa.com) are proud to announce the launch of a new and innovative co-branded program MedBillManager, an online tool for consumers to more effectively manage and evaluate their healthcare expenses.

MedBillManager, www.medbillmanager.com, is an easy-to-use online program that provides individuals with a secure and inexpensive method for managing healthcare expenses while maximizing the value of their healthcare savings account (HSA). Specifically, the program helps consumers organize and compare their medical expenditures. It simplifies everything from provider bills and insurance statements to payment status and calculations of tax-deductible medical expenses. HSA Living customers can sign-up for the MedBillManager program at a discounted rate on the HSA Living’s site, www.HSA.com.

“Healthcare Savings Accounts, and the people that use them, are a perfect fit with change:healthcare’s business goals,” said Christopher Parks, co-founder of change:healthcare. “This co-branded program enables individuals to gain more control over their healthcare options and better manage their healthcare dollar.”

Creating healthcare transparency
By accessing resources on MedBillManager, the HSA account holder can anonymously compare their medical expenses and services to those of all other individuals in their area regardless of the type of insurance. This allows them to capitalize on opportunities for identifying more cost effective healthcare alternatives.

Annual subscription through HAS Living (www.hsa.com) is $19.95 for up to twelve users on one account.

According to Greg Golub, Founder and CEO at HSA Living, “The partnership with change:healthcare reflects our desire to empower customers with the best resources to manage their healthcare costs and make informed decisions about their healthcare options. We know the many challenges of healthcare and having a solution that is easy to use and can be accessed virtually anywhere will make a difference. We are among the first to offer the unique MedBillManager solution.”

A Solution from someone who knows
Christopher Parks, co-founder of change:healthcare, started the company in 2006 after both of his parents passed away within a year of one another. They each suffered lengthy and costly illnesses. According to Parks, “My entire professional career has been spent in the healthcare industry, and still I was overwhelmed by the bills, EOBs, statements, and denials of claims ― not to mention having to deal with the emotional weight of losing my parents. That experience inspired me to do something that would give those who need it more confidence to deal with the healthcare system – something that would help people figure out who they owe, what they owe and what constitutes a fair price.

“For a nation that spends $2.2 trillion on healthcare, MedBillManger is a unique tool for improving the way any individual with medical expenses manages their healthcare.”

About change:healthcare
Based in Nashville, Tennessee, change:healthcare (www.changehealthcare.com) was founded by Christopher Parks in 2006 after the loss of both of his parents to lengthy illnesses. With a mission to make healthcare easier, the company produces web applications that are user friendly, and make navigating the healthcare system easier while additionally promoting transparency in the healthcare market. The change:healthcare product line includes MedBillManager (MedBillManager.com) and FindYourDoc (FindYourDoc.com). Please visit www.medbillmanager.com and click on the link for “Special Offers through our Partners” for more information.

About HSA Living Insurance Services, LLC.
HSA Living™ (www.hsa.com) is an industry leader in providing individuals, families and micro businesses with complete Health Savings Account (HSA) programs that help people take control of their health care decisions and dollars. HSA Living’s unique combination of easy-to-use decision tools, comprehensive online resources and friendly industry experts make it simple for consumers to evaluate and enroll in the right health insurance plan and HSA for them. Please visit www.hsa.com for more.

Medical Bill Review Services and change:healthcare Formalize Alliance

Nashville, Tennessee – Medical Bill Review Services Inc. announces its partnership with change:healthcare LLC. Both companies will work to bring Medical Bill Review Services’ customers an original co-branded version of MedBillManager.

Both companies share the goal of helping individuals maintain efficient and reasonable healthcare costs. Medical Bill Review Services accomplishes it through services while change:healthcare focuses on providing information technology.

Medical Bill Review Services plans to enhance their current services with the addition of MedBillManager. Patsy Kelly President and Founder states, “MedBillManager is a perfect fit with our existing process. The software allows us to tap into the full value of the knowledge we have gained over the years and use it to the benefit of our customers.”

MedBillManager (www.medbillmanager.com) is an online program that provides individuals with a secure means of organizing and managing their healthcare expenditures. This easy-to-use application simplifies everything from provider bills and insurance statements to payment status and calculations of tax-deductible medical expenses.

Medical Bill Review Services is a professional consulting firm that handles a variety of medical billing issues for clients. They will begin using MedBillManager to document their clients’ bills and claims for review and for facilitating negotiations with providers, as well as bill auditing services. The program can also be used to provide reports to their clients.

Simplifying the medical billing process has always been a priority for Christopher Parks, co-founder and CEO of change:healthcare. He states, “We are excited to be partnering with Medical Bill Review Services. Our relationship brings great benefit to all MedBillManager users. The incorporation of Medical Bill Review Services additional input will enhance our ability to provide useful comparisons of healthcare expenses across the nation.”

About Medical Bill Review Services Inc.
Founded in 2002, Medical Bill Review Services, Inc. is a full service medical billing/compliance review company based in Nashville specializing in medical claims, health care insurance and compliance consulting to individuals, claims administrators, corporations, medical providers and healthcare facilities.

About change:healthcare llc.
Based in Nashville, Tennessee, change:healthcare (www.changehealthcare.com) was founded by Christopher Parks in 2006 after the loss of both of his parents to lengthy illnesses. With a mission to make healthcare easier, the company produces web applications that are user friendly, and make navigating the healthcare system easier while additionally promoting transparency in the healthcare market. The change:healthcare product line includes MedBillManager (MedBillManager.com) and FindYourDoc (FindYourDoc.com). Please visit www.changehealthcare.com for more information.

I was having a peaceful Tuesday afternoon, happy that it was finally under 100 degrees for the first time in weeks, when my boss sent me and email titled “Fwd: Google Alert – “medical bills”. Well of course I opened it (it’s from my boss), but I had no clue what I was about to read.

The email says: Google News Alert for “medical bill”

And the top headline reads:

“Drowning in medical bills, man kisses ailing wife before throwing …
Ottawa Citizen - Ontario, Canada
Her medical bills ranged from $700 to $800 US a week, and she has no health insurance, according to court records. In April, her husband petitioned the…”

I suggest only daring individuals check this one out. (Now do not be fool by the Ontario Canada publication, the incident took place in Kansas City, Missouri.) Talk about snapping out of the joy of a beautiful day. The man literally did not want to face his wife’s medical bill any longer, so he threw her to her death off their balcony.

If you are interested in the other wonderful headlines Google News Alert had to offer for “medical bills” here you go:

Identity thieves go medical
TheNewsTribune.com (subscription) – Tacoma,WA,USA
Study your medical bills and health insurer’s explanation of benefits. *Report suspicious transactions to your health insurer’s special investigations…

Medical Insurance Refuses To Pay Maternity Bills
KUTV – Salt Lake City,UT,USA
Allstate is now paying for all the covered medical bills for the pregnancy and birth. That is exactly why Brett and Ashlee purchased medical insurance in …

San Diego Hospitals Sue County Over Prisoners’ Medical Bills
KPBS – San Diego,CA,USA
The dispute centers on medical bills run up last year by prisoners of the sheriff’s department. The hospitals say the sheriff’s department has to pay the …

AHHHHH…..What is the world of healthcare coming to? Is this what the crisis is driving people to do?

Let’s hope that the system gets repaired before this kind of story becomes the majority rather than the minority.

For the individuals out there that still think we do not have a problem with our healthcare system, check out some of these stories. Maybe ask yourself… if you were having these kinds of medical problems or expenses “What would healthcare drive you to do?”

Chris Fleming of Health Affairs Blog has highlighted the debate surrounding State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) reauthorization, discontinuities, and enrollment in his blog. Undeniably this is such an important topic. I wrote a research paper this spring on uninsured children and the variations across SCHIP. Unfortunately the discussion is warranted (referencing the first article and second article he pointed out in Health Affairs). There are gaps in coverage, low enrollment, and eligibility changes and interruptions.

Though the function of my research paper was not to express my opinion, rather to report information, I certainly developed one by the end of it.

Reading all of these different individuals’ research on the SCHIP debate frustrates me.

• First, they cannot seem provide me with any new information in addition to what I discovered last spring.

• Second, how is everyone missing the point? Really. I want to read an article by an individual that has an opinion on how our policy makers have failed once again and created a patchy program. I do not need to read more statistics. Give me a solution.

Consequently I have decided to share my opinion on the topic…. And I would love to hear anyone else’s opinion or proposed solution.

To me SCHIP is about developing and supporting the youth of our country. We have developed and supported our country’s children for years through public schooling. We give every child the chance to succeed in life through educational opportunities from youth to adolescence. “Knowledge equals power”… right?

Well kind of. In this country it’s more along the lines… “Knowledge and health contribute to wealth and wealth equals power.” For this reason I believe that every child should additionally be afforded the chance to maintain a good bill of health. I cannot see how anyone, especially children, who doesn’t have access to a doctor, or medication, or any other care they need from the health arena (e.g. psychiatry, physical therapy), can truly succeed in school, much less life.

The answer is not about increasing enrollment, making single mothers, fathers and families fill out application forms, standardizing eligibility, or closing gaps in coverage. The answer is providing every child with free education and free healthcare.

If this were the premise of childhood (free education and free healthcare) I might reconsider my opinion on needing a more “universal” healthcare system. Who knows, I might even believe that our government was providing children with an equal (well at least a more honest) chance of succeeding as adults.

At the end of the day I simply wouldn’t feel so bad about turning people loose at 18, expecting them to contribute to society and figure out their own healthcare.

We were all told as children to respect our elders, and obviously our country does that. We provide social security and healthcare (Medicare) to the individuals that have contributed to what our country has become today. This country also needs to learn to value our children, the future contributors, by giving them every opportunity to learn and remain healthy throughout childhood.

So who’s to blame for America’s healthcare problems? In part 1 or my 2 part series, I had told you the reasons why I feel that individuals and physicians and health practitioner deserve some of the blame for our systems complications.

Note: www.charlesclarknovels.com made a wonderful comment on part 1, highlighting accountability (if you’re interested go back and read his comment on part 1). In an industry dominated by tiers of power, responsibility plays a part. However, accountability may be more important. Its one thing to be responsible for your actions, its another to be accountable for the way in which they effect others. And yes unfortunately, Stark is taking a very long nap, and many individuals are taking advantage of his slumber.

Moving on, I have two more culprits to add to my first two. Here it goes…

3.) Insurance companies

Insurance costs and the industry’s connection to employment (which is unpredictable and unstable) make private health insurance primarily available only to the middle and upper class.

As companies began to focus on experience rating and classifications of employment, individuals with minimal income or chronic health conditions have been increasingly pushed out of the private insurance arena. The cost burden of private insurance has been shifted to the employers who continue to push the additional costs directly to their employees. Individuals with the increased burden of medical problems are having to additionally handle the increased cost burden of the industry.

Arguably though, the biggest problem with insurance companies rests in their organizational structure. The solutions this industry was intended to provide have alternatively enabled the rising cost of healthcare. Rising costs have directly led to higher premiums and deductibles that place a financial burden on the individuals with private insurance.

4.) The Government

All and all, I would have to argue that the government deserves most of the blame for America’s confounding healthcare problems. Though Medicare and Medicaid have improved care to the elderly and the impoverished, the programs simply fall short of providing a solution. Still to this day, after Medicare and Medicaid were created more than 40 years ago, a large number of patients remain unaware of the services and care options afforded to them through these government programs.

Not only are patients suffering from the lack of a unified and reliable government healthcare program, but the institutions providing the care assume the burden. Under funded and struggling with the uninsured, many institutions are taking responsibility for individuals’ lack of coverage. Unfortunately there isn’t even a set amount of government money given to health institutions to defray the cost and burden of treating the uninsured. This places many medical institutions on the verge of closing every year, which would only furthers the burden on the system…

Recently Michael Moore attempted to tackle “who’s to blame?” As many of you know he has quite the art for blaming big institutions like the government and insurance companies. Unfortunately, its not that simple. Practitioners and individuals deserve some of the blame as well. But ultimately I must point my finger at the fact that our government has allowed individuals and practitioners to absorb the burden of their continued lack of unified involvement. If the government were to take more responsibility for the current problems of our system, then the other parties could not opt out of the blame. Each of these sectors, individuals, practitioners, insurance companies, and the government, contributes to the problem in their own unique way.

Our healthcare system needs a reevaluation of responsibility and collective reform of the system in all four of these sectors. Individuals need to begin to take more responsibility for their health, practitioners need to follow up and stop blaming the system, insurance companies need to consider alternative methods of coverage, and most importantly the government needs to begin to view healthcare as a basic human right before any real changes could be made.

I’m sure you have witnessed a variety of conversations about America’s healthcare crisis, I certainly have. I spent a whole semester senior year studying our disheveled system in Fundamental Issue of Medicine, Health, and Society. I heard presentations from health economists, alternative medicine practitioners and read several informative books on what I assume is only the beginning of our country’s problems with healthcare. The more information I consumed, the foggier my mind got. Insurance methods seem anything but consistent, Medicaid has so many restrictions that only a certified Medicaid specialist could really know what’s allowed and what’s not, and everyone seems to want to blame someone else for our problems.

My very first paper in Fundamental Issues was based on the book “Mama Might Be Better Off Dead,” which highlighted the foes of our current healthcare system, and asked the question “Who’s to blame for America’s healthcare problems?” I dwelled on this question for days trying to figure out who’s to blame. I literally put the paper off until the very last minute, starting my very first paragraph (with no direction at all) at 9pm the night before it was due. All I could think was “who’s to blame, who’s to blame, who’s to blame” when luckily about an hour into it my head cleared… “if only it were that simple.” Obviously it’s not simple at all… that’s the whole point. There is no easy answer to the question “Who’s to blame?”

There are a lot of people and things at fault for where our system stands today, however I have whittled the answer down to four easily identifiable entities within the healthcare arena.

So for your reading pleasure here is who I think is to blame for our current healthcare problems.

1.) Individuals

A certain level of responsibility rests in the hands of each individual. People must learn to value good health and strive toward achieving healthy states. Though some personal choices unavoidably correlate with socioeconomic status such as food availability and exercise, decisions to add extra salt to food, drink alcohol in excess and continue to smoke do not. These habits can be altered and controlled by the individual. Additional factors such as compliance and communication influence personal responsibility.

However, personal accountability for one’s own health represents a convoluted American ideal. The medical system embodies a stigma that holds individuals morally responsible for getting sick and seemingly ignores the compounding socioeconomic problems. Yet, the importance of personal accountability cannot be dismissed or blamed on some other aspect of the system. Refusing to wear a brace, not taking medications due to undesirable yet manageable side effects, and failing to get children immunized are not choices complicated by socioeconomic problems of the medical systems themselves. Rather they represent choices in the domain of personal responsibility that could have positively influenced an individual’s health had decisions to comply with medical advice been made.

2.) Physicians and Health Practitioners

The basic concept that doctors should provide their patient with complete, competent, and consistent medical care dominates societal aspirations for the profession. Unfortunately this is easier said than done for many doctors. There still seems to be no consistent system in place for following up with patients. Many people still receive care from doctors that are poor communicators, who fail time and time again to address the true extent of their patients problems (Don’t believe me? Read some of the true stories out there such as “Mama Might Be Better Off Dead” and “The Social Medicine Reader”). Typically it’s hard to ignore a doctor’s direct responsibility for the level of care they provide their patients.

Additionally, doctors need to stand up and address issues regarding the difficulty of providing complete care for their patients in such a patchwork system of healthcare options. Doctors hold a large amount of knowledge and power in American society. This fact just further elevates the responsibility doctors should take for the care they provide their patients, the manner in which they use their knowledge, and their power to offer patients the most effective care available.

Wonder who else is to blame? Check back, I’ll be sure to let you know…

Since joining the change:healthcare team I told myself that I would attempt to keep myself up to date on what people are talking about in the health care arena. Just yesterday I came across an interesting article Vince Kuraitis had written titled “Disease Management and Health Outcomes” (linked from his blog by special permission). As I scanned the article and blog post, reading about disease management (DM) and chronic care management (CCM), I couldn’t help but wonder “who’s acting as the patient advocate?” So I went ahead and asked Mr. Kuraitis what he thought.

Commenting on his blog entry “Disease Management and the Medical Home Model: Competing of Complementary?” I wrote, “In considering the convergence of DM and CCM, and the ability for doctors to “compete” in some sense over providing care-coordination services, I wonder who will be the patient advocate. The individuals suffering from chronic diseases, who are in constant need of efficient and effective medical care, need better tools to guide them through the cluttered system of care that currently exists in this country. I think that it is incredibly important for the health care community to begin supporting and educating consumers. Unfortunately, there is not enough of this happening. It seems like developments in new care models occur due to efforts made by the big companies, rather than the individuals driving need for care. Ideas?”

Well Mr. Kuraitis seemed to be on the same page as me. He responded via email,
“Your point about patient advocacy is valid and well taken. Yes, fundamentally the DM and Medical Home models are driven by business interests. Like it or not, the reality is that we have a mostly free market health care system, unlike most other countries.

Ultimately, this doesn’t make the DM model or the Medical Home model inconsistent with patient advocacy, but that’s not their starting point.”

I really appreciated Mr. Kuraitis’ response. He is much more experienced than I am in the business world (being that I am just getting started) and can probably evaluate new health care models at the turn of a dime. However, I still have an opinion… and here it is.

Like it or not, some companies, like change:healthcare, regardless of our “mostly free market health care system” want to develop models driven by consumer/patient needs rather than business interests. Hopefully the more companies take this approach, the more patients can educate themselves on the health care system, therefore empowering them to make health care decisions that really fit their interests rather than the “business”.

So in conclusion, I am proud to be part of a company that has plans to bring consumers and patients products and services that are targeted toward their interests. And if there are any suggestions on how we can do it better, by all means please let me know!