Health and wellness

Starting next year, PPACA will lead to a 3.8% surtax on many people’s investment income, but there are ways around it.

President Obama’s re-election rallied shares for hospitals last week as the number of insured Americans is set to rise. Health insurance companies, however, face profit limits and new taxes.

The Congressional Budget Office said in a report that a Congressional fix to exclude broker commissions from medical loss ratio calculations will increase deficits by $531 million over the 2013-2017 period.

The president’s re-election probably spells doom for any short-term efforts to overturn PPACA, and industry professionals who waited to implement health care reform changes can wait no longer.

Health insurance company stocks fall Wednesday after Obama’s re-election affirms PPACA will move forward. Health reform’s product standardization and transparency will “pressure margins,” insurers say, offsetting any potential for increased profits from a larger client base.

Up to 20% of those who take currently available medication to lower bad cholesterol suffer from side effects, but new medicines may take unusual forms — engineered tomatoes and yogurt.

The president’s re-election probably spells doom for any short-term efforts to overturn PPACA, and industry professionals who waited to implement health care reform changes can wait no longer.

The average worker who files long-term disability from acute coronary syndrome misses 397 days of work, for which they will only be paid 271, finds a new study presented at an American Heart Association meeting this week.

Guest blogger Linda K. Riddell offers practical advice to achieve what all employers want: more, better, faster wellness results.

Repealing health care reform would be no easy task for a President-elect Romney, says employee benefits attorney Frank Palmieri, adding that if Obama is re-elected, he has lots of work to do to keep implementation going smoothly.

A recent survey shows a lack of planning around health care reform on the part of many small businesses, and even confusion over the obligation to provide coverage.

A survey by online health benefits seller eHealthInsurance finds that more than three-quarters of small business clients are not doing long-term planning on how health reform, including insurance exchanges, may affect their business.

People who have low well-being, a Healthway study concludes, are twice as likely to have high health care claims costs and four times more likely to visit the emergency room or take short-term disability leave.

Lafarge enlists the help of Dr. Michael Roizen from the Cleveland Clinic to transform the company’s culture of wellness.

Manatee County in Florida and Fond du Lac County in Wisconsin outline their wellness programs that tailor outreach to individual employee needs

Nancy Bolton maintains employers need to plan and implement health care reform provisions no matter who wins the presidential election

Adviser representatives were encouraged by recognition of their role in employee benefits delivery, as a bill allowing for the exclusion of commissions from health reform's medical loss ratio calculations moved forward in late September.

How to use stories to sell wellness.

Turning PPACA compliance into profit for advisers brokers by Nelson Griswold.

John Lamb shares the new math of employee benefits.