Newswire Archives
The U.S. Department of Education has delayed the effective date of the state authorization of distance education and correspondence education regulations by two years. The federal regulation, which was published on December 19, 2016, was to be effective July 1, 2018. The Department has proposed another round of negotiated rulemaking.
The latest rule on the delay may be accessed here and the rule on the negotiated rulemaking may be accessed here.
A new issue brief from The Trust for America’s Health and Well Being Trust highlights actions that the health care system – including hospitals and health systems – can take to help address issues like drug overdoses, alcohol-related deaths and suicides.
The issue brief can be obtained at http://healthyamericans.org/assets/files/PainNationHealthCareBrief-05.pdf.
A new Commonwealth Fund scorecard that measures health system performance in all 50 states and the District of Columbia shows that the combined death rate from suicide, alcohol, opioids, and other drugs increased by 50 percent nationwide between 2005 and 2016. Mortality rates for treatable medical conditions also rose, reversing a decade-long downward national trend. Gaps in mental health care are pervasive as well. On the plus side, the ability to obtain affordable health care improved, with states that expanded eligibility for Medicaid experiencing the biggest gains from 2013 to 2016.
An interactive state scorecard digital report can be obtained at http://www.commonwealthfund.org/interactives/2018/may/state-scorecard/files/Radley_State_Scorecard_2018.pdf.
The Interprofessional Education Collaborative (IPEC) will host their fourth event in their 2018 IPEC Webinar Series aimed at highlighting trends and activities in interprofessional education (IPE) and practice. The Webinar "Promoting Health & Wellness Through Collaboration"will take place Thursday, May 24 at 2:00 pm ET and feature panelists Drs. Lisa Desai (Screening for Mental Health, Riverside Community Care) and Aviad Haramati (Center for Innovation and Leadership in Education, Georgetown University Medical Center). Drs. Desai and Haramati will share remarks on strategies and approaches that can enhance the capacity for resilience among teams of health students and practitioners. This free, dynamic webinar is open to deans, faculty, staff, and students from IPEC member schools, as well as non-members, communities of interest, and practice representatives.
You may access more details, including a registration link, here: https://www.ipecollaborative.org/webinars.html
The postsecondary landscape has become increasingly complex, and as a result, has diminished transparency around student outcomes. A new report from the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce untangles today's college and career maze and shows that workers with a bachelor’s degree have median earnings nearly double that of workers with no more than a high school diploma. It also finds that the difference in annual median earnings between the highest and lowest paying majors is $39,000.
The report can be obtained at https://cew-7632.kxcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/Fiverules.pdf.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released a redesigned version of the Drug Spending Dashboards, which include year-over-year information on drug pricing and highlight which manufactures have been increasing their prices. The dashboards are interactive online tools that allow patients, clinicians, researchers, and the public to understand trends in drug spending with data reported for both Medicare and Medicaid.
Additional information can be obtained at https://www.cms.gov/Newsroom/MediaReleaseDatabase/Press-releases/2018-Press-releases-items/2018-05-15.html.
A Data Point from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) examines the extent to which work experience programs (such as internships and apprenticeships) are related to formal education, and the characteristics of these education-based programs.
The Data Point can be obtained at https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2018/2018058.pdf.
A task force produced a report in the form of a "roadmap" for alternative federal system for apprenticeships. A 20-member task force of experts, including the secretaries of education, labor, and commerce participated in the development of recommendations.
The report can be obtained at https://www.dol.gov/apprenticeship/docs/20180510-task-force-meeting-final-report.pdf.
According to a report from the Pew Research Center, the number of foreign college students staying and working in the U.S. after graduation has surged. Federal training program experienced a four-fold increase in foreign students graduating and working in STEM fields from 2008 to 2016.
The report can be obtained at http://assets.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/05/10110621/Pew-Research-Center_Foreign-Student-Graduate-Workers-on-OPT_2018.05.10.pdf.
In a new interview on the AHRQ Patient Safety Network website, Commonwealth Fund President David Blumenthal, M.D., talks about progress in health information technology in the decade since passage of the HITECH (Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health) Act and reflects on his time serving as National Coordinator for Health Information Technology.
The interview can be obtained at https://psnet.ahrq.gov/perspectives/perspective/248
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Rural Health Council released the agency’s first Rural Health Strategy intended to provide a proactive approach on healthcare issues and to ensure that individuals who live in rural America have access to high quality, affordable healthcare.
The Strategy can be obtained at https://www.cms.gov/About-CMS/Agency-Information/OMH/Downloads/Rural-Strategy-2018.pdf.
A report made available at the end of April 2018 discusses how preliminary figures show faster growth in the amounts governments in Canada are budgeting for healthcare over the past three years. These figures likely understate the acceleration, since later figures typically reveal that provinces and territories have overshot their budget targets. These budgets have tended to grow faster than Canada’s economy, raising concerns about the fiscal sustainability of that country’s healthcare system.
The report can be obtained at file:///C:/Users/Owner/Downloads/SSRN-id3157955%20(1).pdf.
Schools may lose their ability to participate in federal student aid programs if a significant percentage of their borrowers default on their student loans within the first 3 years of repayment. A report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) examines (1) how schools work with borrowers to manage default rates and how these strategies affect borrowers and schools’ accountability for defaults; and (2) the extent to which the Department of Education oversees the strategies schools and their default management consultants use to manage schools’ default rates.[TE1]
The report can be obtained at https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/691520.pdf.
An independent panel convened by the National Institutes of Health outlined several recommendations to improve research to end the obesity epidemic, emphasizing the need for an expanded approach to obesity research. Additional methods are needed to assess obesity prevention interventions occurring at the community level. The panel’s report includes recommendations to enhance data systems and integration, standardize measurement of obesity-related outcomes, and improve methods for study design and analysis.
The report can be obtained at https://prevention.nih.gov/docs/p2p/P2P_Obesity_Panel_Report_Final.pdf.
The Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce released new research for the Century Foundation Working Group on Community College Financial Resources about a novel outcomes-based earnings standard for all postsecondary education programs. The report analyzes the value and cost of college programs and establishes a standard that would allow graduates to attain middle class earnings and recoup their education costs within a decade of graduation.
The report can be obtained at https://cew-7632.kxcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/TCF_EducationalAdequacyReport.pdf.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has released the Mental Health and Substance Use Disorder Parity Action Plan. It was required under statute by the 21st Century Cures Act, and outlines recent and forthcoming actions from HHS, the Department of Labor, and the Department of Treasury. The Action Plan aligns with HHS’ five-pillar strategy to address the opioid crisis.
The plan can be obtained at https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/parity-action-plan-b.pdf.
Federal spending on health care—driven primarily by Medicare and Medicaid—is expected to exceed $1 trillion in 2018. The Affordable Care Act created the CMS Innovation Center to test new approaches to health care delivery, known as models that could curb spending while providing better care. We reviewed the center's efforts. A report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) discusses the center’s efforts to evaluate these models from the standpoint of achieving goals.
The report can be obtained at https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/690875.pdf.
Years of life lost, a measure of premature death, declined 28% for black Americans and 4% for white Americans between 1990 and 2014, according to a study published on April 25 in the journal PLoS ONE. Whites had a higher proportion of early deaths due to drug overdose than other races, while blacks had a higher proportion of early deaths due to homicide and heart disease.
The article can be obtained at http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0194308&type=printable.
April 28 is National Prescription Drug Take Back Day, an event that aims to provide a safe, convenient, and responsible means of disposing of prescription drugs, while also educating the general public about the potential for abuse of medications.
Locations for doing so can be found at https://apps.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/NTBI/NTBI-PUB.pub?_flowExecutionKey=_c458EC1EB-EE94-AC25-8DF9-4BC072DF5418_k5158939A-599D-CCAF-9BC2-F356A3F54EA8.
A post from the Commonwealth Fund argues that while solutions emphasizing food and diet may help in individual cases, policy solutions are required to fight the obesity epidemic nationally. It is a grave public health threat — more serious even than the opioid epidemic — and still on the rise in the United States. The latest federal data show that nearly 40 percent of American adults were obese in 2015–16, up from 34 percent in 2007–08.
The post can be obtained at http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/blog/2018/apr/rising-obesity-public-health-crisis?omnicid=EALERT1391680&mid=thomas@asahp.org.
