On a monthly and quarterly basis, health insurance payers including Medicaid, over 33 commercial payers, and Medicare submit claims to the Colorado All Payer Claims Database (CO APCD). Payers submit claims for everyone they provide coverage to, regardless of whether they accessed health care during the previous period or not, Read more…
By Ana English, CIVHC President and CEO The Dollars and Sense blog series is about sharing perspectives and information that change the conversation around lowering costs in health care. In August, I had the honor to participate in a panel about health care transparency hosted by Colorado Healthcare Strategy and Read more…
By Stephanie Spriggs, CIVHC’s Content and Report Manager Five years ago, my father had a massive heart attack. Thankfully, he was rushed to the emergency room and straight into the intensive care unit (ICU). His condition was so bad that he was on more nitroglycerin than his nurse had ever Read more…
by Cari Frank, CIVHC’s VP of Communication and Marketing My friend’s father just had surgery to release pressure from an accident that caused swelling in his brain. After the bill arrived, he was shocked that the surgeon billed $10,000 for the surgery, yet only received $1,500 from Medicare. That’s when Read more…
Any car owner can tell you that many, many components make up the vehicles we rely on every day to ferry us between work and home or between errands. And accordingly, mechanics have become increasingly specialized – especially now that cars are getting more complicated every year. You have a Read more…
By Rachel Linn, CIVHC’s Marketing Manager For those of us fortunate enough to have health insurance, it is easy to anticipate the costs we will pay for health care services. For example, I have a fixed co-pay plan, and know that if I visit my doctor, regardless of how much Read more…
CIVHC’s partnerships are essential for addressing palliative care, serious and advanced illness, advance care planning and care transitions. Optimizing alignment of multi-stakeholder efforts designed to improve care for patients, families and caregivers is a shared objective here in Colorado where collaborations within and among communities are longstanding. Now a significant Read more…
For the past several years, interns from Colorado schools have helped CIVHC with some of our largest projects. During the summer of 2018, two students from the LEADS Program at the University of Colorado’s School of Medicine in Aurora have been working to develop methodology for a Total Cost of Read more…
By Rachel Linn, CIVHC’s Marketing Manager Last week, my husband called me with debilitating abdominal pain and was unable to stand, let alone drive himself to a provider to receive care. As an employee of CIVHC, my brain immediately went to thoughts around the expenses we were going to incur Read more…
During the annual meeting in June, CIVHC’s Board of Directors elected Mark Wallace, MD, MPH, as the incoming Board Chair. Dr. Wallace is Chief Executive Officer and Chief Medical Officer for the North Colorado Health Alliance, and serves as Executive Director of Weld County Department of Public Health & Environment. Read more…