Arkansas is ranked 44th out of the 50 states and the District of Columbia for overall health system performance in a new report by The Commonwealth Fund. Read More
A statistical brief released earlier this year by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality finds that Arkansas has high rates of inpatient stays for certain mental health disorders and identifies the regions of the states that are most impacted. Read More
Weighted blankets and swaddles, crib bumper pads, and inclined sleep surfaces are unsafe for infants and should not be used where infants sleep, according to newly updated safe-sleep recommendations from the American Academy of Pediatrics. Read More
The Arkansas Healthcare Transparency Initiative (HTI) was established in 2015 to provide a source of informative healthcare data to support consumers, researchers, and policymakers. The Arkansas All-Payer Claims Database (APCD) is one of the tools in the HTI used to accomplish these efforts. Read More
In a unanimous 5-0 vote, the Federal Trade Commission announced Tuesday, June 7, it will launch an examination into the business practices of pharmacy benefit managers. Read More
The recent announcement by Lyon College that it intends to establish a dental school in Little Rock is welcome news for a state that has had persistent dental access issues, ACHI Health Policy Director Craig Wilson, a Lyon alum, writes in his latest column for Talk Business & Politics. Read More
ACHI Health Policy Director on Arkansas's rural health via Rural Health Leadership Radio Podcast, addressing healthcare challenges and innovations. Read More
Commercial insurers in Arkansas paid hospitals rates that more closely matched Medicare rates compared to commercial insurers in other states in 2020, according to a new research report by the RAND Corporation that examines inpatient and outpatient hospital payment rates for more than 4,000 hospitals in nearly all states. Read More
Substance use disorder, especially involving opioids, is a complex subject that has reached every corner of our nation. Unlike the COVID-19 pandemic, for substance abuse disorder there is no vaccine or simple, easy-to-follow health guidance to lower the risk or reduce the damage. Instead, there are many different prevention, treatment, harm reduction, and recovery methods that can be deployed in response to addiction. Just as virus that causes COVID-19 continues to spawn variants, there are ever-expanding trends in substance use. Read More
While the debate over student loan debt forgiveness grabs headlines, another kind of debt is also receiving some attention from policymakers, credit rating agencies, and the healthcare industry: medical debt. In his latest column for Talk Business & Politics, ACHI Health Policy Director Craig Wilson discusses efforts at the state and federal levels to address Americans’ largest source of debt in collections. Read More
