Showing posts with label The Texas Tribune. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Texas Tribune. Show all posts

Friday, December 26, 2014

No longer headline news

December 26, 2014 Illegal Immigration , Immigration 0 Comments
Immigrants Still Surging Into Texas Shelters

Julian Aguilar, Dec. 24, 2014, Texas Tribune

The number of unaccompanied minors apprehended, or who have surrendered, has gone down from about 5,460 in October and November of 2013 to about 3,220 during the same months this year. But the number of parents with one or more minor children has stayed about the same: 3,430 in October and November of last year compared with 3,360 this year.

Read more: www.tucsonsentinel.com

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Saturday, April 12, 2014

Giving Up On Red Tape, Doctors Turn To Cash-Based Model --Avoids costly bureaucracy, growing trend

April 12, 2014 Alexa Ura , Dr. Gustavo Villarreal 0 Comments
Alexa Ura, Apr. 11, 2014, The Texas Tribune
LAREDO — For 12 hours a day, the waiting room at Dr. Gustavo Villarreal’s family practice is often packed with patients, people who will pay a flat $50 fee for the convenience — or necessity — of a walk-in, quick-turn doctor’s visit. Villarreal’s practice, which does not accept any form of health insurance, has thrived despite its location in a city where nearly one-third of the population lives below the federal poverty line.
  
At both the state and federal level, efforts are underway to decrease Texas' sky-high rate of residents without health coverage. But Villarreal is among a rising number of primary care practitioners who have given up on the red tape of filing insurance claims, switching to a cash-based model that is growing in popularity among Texas’ insured and uninsured patients.

Doctors who use this model, which they call “direct primary care,” say they can keep their costs competitive by avoiding the bureaucracy of the health insurance system and the high processing costs — including additional staff — associated with accepting coverage.

“It had always been affordable and possible to maintain a practice with what insurance and patients paid, but about 10 or 15 years ago, you started seeing a decline” in revenue, said Villarreal, who switched his traditional family practice to its current business model in 2012.  

 Most doctors limit their services to basic or preventive care — treatment their patients can afford without turning to their insurance providers — such as prescribing medicine for colds and infections, treating minor lesions and overseeing long-term care for conditions like diabetes and osteoporosis.

Read the full story:  www.texastribune.org


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