Health Care Reform Today

• Tom Richards
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  Tom Richards

  

  Tom Richards

  President Individual and Family Plans, Online Experience and Health Care Reform

It's clear the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act or PPACA, for short, has already changed America's health care regulatory landscape. We've accomplished a lot since it was signed into law on March 23, 2010, but there's much more to come as the law continues to unfold.

The goals of health care reform are ambitious - to enhance access, lower cost and improve health for all Americans. These are things we can all support.

However, there's still a lot of work to be done to improve affordability and quality. Our leadership is involved both in Washington and at the state level in advocating on behalf of our clients, customers, and other people we serve to ensure that their interests are heard by those in government responsible for implementing and enforcing the legislation and regulations.

We are actively engaged in the dialogue and offer innovative solutions so that final regulations will better support improved health, wellness and productivity. In many cases, we partner with industry groups or our employer clients to strengthen our approach. What are some recent hot topics? We are focused on the Summary of Coverage and Benefits, the definition of "essential health benefits," the application of PPACA to expatriate plans and the health care exchanges that will be available in 2014, to name a few. Please see our advocacy position papers for more on our views and potential impacts.

Looking Ahead

The future health care marketplace is slowly starting to take shape as clarifying regulations are issued and the states begin to develop their exchanges. In the meantime the PPACA is facing challenges - both in court and from Congress. We will continue to monitor all these developments and provide regular updates.

This column, Health Care Reform Today, is designed to help you understand what health care reform means for you as an individual, employer, broker or consultant.

Our goal is to talk about the latest news and offer our views on how the law may impact you, your business and the health care industry. We hope you'll check it out whenever you visit our Informed on Reform website. We will rotate topics and columnists frequently so I invite you to bookmark this page and check back often.

Tom Richards is President of Cigna's Individual and Family Plans Segment, Online Experience and Health Care Reform.