...that the original contract to build the website was awarded to CGI for 93.7 million dollars (Webster, 2013). According to Performance, “Healthcare.gov took three years and cost an estimated $687 million dollars to develop” (“Performance”, n.d.). A difference of 594 million dollars. The purpose of this paper is to inform the audience of the reasons why the health care exchange On March 23, 2010 President Obama signed, “The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act 2010” otherwise known as the “Affordable Care Act.” In order to implement the new health insurance mandate, a federal website had to be built. The federal website was to be linked to state based websites. According to Carr, “although the exchanges were envisioned under the law as being state-based, the federal government will operate the supporting online services in whole or in part for 36 states” (Carr, 2013). These states refused to run state based exchanges. According to Howles, “After the launch, there were immediate concerns about the site: It was slow, and many users were denied access altogether. Even President Obama admitted that “people have gotten stuck” (Howles, 2014). According to Alter, during the October launch, “more than a quarter million people were prevented from even beginning to enroll by glitches and errors. On several occasions in October and November, the system crashed altogether” (Alter, 2014). Given the results of the launch of HealhCare.gov, project management best practice standards were...
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...AGILE PROJECT MANAGEMENT "On February 11-13, 2001, at The Lodge at Snowbird ski resort in the Wasatch mountains of Utah, seventeen people met to talk, ski, relax, and try to find common ground... What emerged was the Agile Software Development Manifesto." (www.agilemanifesto.org) The precursor to Agile project management was the brainchild of Dr. Winston Royce. Introduced in his 1970 treatise, “Managing the Development of Large Software Systems,”1 Dr. Royce presented a 5-point rebuttal of the sequential development Waterfall Model, which had been the status quo for project managment. The waterfall model views a process as a series of steps cascading downwards as shown in the illustration below: Fig. 1: The Waterfall Model Originating in industries concerned with complex physical structures such as skyscrapers, vehicles, and machines, the waterfall model suited these type of projects. The underslying assumption was that late-stage modifications were constrained by the high costs and difficulties inherent in physically modifying a large, complex structure after construction or assembly had begun. The first sequential project management protocol is attributed to Walther Shewhart at Bell Labs, who coined the phrase "Plan-Do-Study-Act"2 in the 1930s. His ideas were advanced in the following decade by the so-called "father of the post-war Japanese industrial renaissance",3 William Edwards Demings, Bell and...
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...take care of the general welfare of the population, but healthcare is not defined as a right in the Bill or Rights or anywhere else in the constitution (US Constitution Online, 2010). While I believe healthcare is a privilege, I believe the government has a duty to ensure that its citizens are given the basic level of care necessary to consider them treated, whether government or citizens are paying for it. It isn’t defined as a right to Americans to have health care. In the same sense, I feel that the provisional code that states that it is the nurse’s primary commitment is to the patient, whether an individual, family, group or community is where the general welfare is spoken about (AACN, 2005). After reading an article on the website, heritage.org (2010), I feel that in this day and time, the determination of who has access to health care has fallen to the government. It is directly and indirectly related. It is related because the reform mandates that everyone has insurance whether it is from the government or from an employer. Employers are having a hard time finding low-cost premiums that provide the employee with a variety of options for medical treatment. Some find it easier to just not provide insurance benefits therefore the employee has to depend on government insurance and this is where they are given their treatment options, which are usually fewer than what employer’s could typically offer the employee with better policies. According to the code of ethics...
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...in which millions of uninsured Americans would have the ability to compare prices and shop for a variety of quality, affordable plans that best met their health care needs (Lee, 2013). In order for the marketplace to be successful, it needed to carry out a slew of tasks including: verify a person’s identity, legal residence, and income; check eligibility status; calculate subsidy; and allow enrollment (Carmody, 2013). In addition, the site would have to interact with a large number of databases operated by various federal and state agencies. Therefore, the website needed to be interfaced with various entities including IRS, Social Security Administrations, and the Department of Homeland Security and credit bureaus (Carmody, 2013). The government assigned Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), an agency that has traditionally administered key aspects of the Medicare and Medicaid programs, the role of project manager (Carmody 2013). CMS began the process by looking for companies to contract. They awarded the biggest contract to CGI, a Canadian consulting company, to build the federal exchange and to provide related technical support. Quality Software Service (QSSI) was then hired...
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... Individual Project # 3 September 1, 2015 Executive Summary The primary intent of this paper is to compare the current strategy and operational approaches for two pharmacy retail stores such as Walmart and Walgreens chain stores. A SWOT analysis for both companies is bellow in table. My understanding after the initial study / investigation is that Walgreens has chosen to be conservative with their strategy in increasing their customer reach, market and base by a more organic growth than Walmart which growth approach is to rapidly build small and large supercenters on major neighborhoods in the United States and key cities around the world. The main strategy reporting evidence that reflect these two companies operational growth is mainly reflected in each financial statement that shows profit and loses for each company and their reinvestment percentage into each one. The financial analyses display the result of each company decisions to their market growth approach and impact on investment. Because of their more conservative stand and minimum risk taken by Walgreen’s, their operations model seems more solid and better prepare to accept their rate of growth in contrast to Walmart aggressive scheduled and heavy investment direction. Two different and what appear to be very effective approaches despite their very recent and impressive operations growth for each company. SWOT Analysis Walmart Weakness ...
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...Health Care Reform: the Macro Perspective Andrew Ojo HCS/550 December 16, 2013 Connie Melton Health Care Reform, the Macro Perspective Often a time individuals living in America wonders how the health care system could change for the better. One problem that has constantly troubled the minds of consumers have been the subject of health care cost and restrictions invoked by health care coverage providers. At the moment, most of the American people need quality health care services resulting mainly from lack of health care coverage. Here in the United States health care policy and health care service has become controversial domestic issue. Most Americans have this believe that there is a strain on their budgets resulting from how much they have to pay for health care, even employers are complaining that they pay too much as share of cost for employees (Shader, 2013). According to William (2009), the U. S spend a huge portion of its gross national product mainly on health care as compared to other countries. U.S Chamber of Commerce (2013), “The United States spends $2.7 trillion a year on healthcare, and in 2011, the government was on the hook for $38.6 trillion in unfunded liabilities for Medicare”. At present, the United States has relatively poor outcomes in the state health for her citizens to show for the expenditures. In a bid, to find a lasting solution to this concerns, the legislative arms in conjunction with government heads enacted a series of laws in recent...
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...about how people are going to vote and what factors supposedly lead them to vote a certain way. It seems that much of the time the analysis of these issues is of a qualitative nature, and with that in mind this paper will attempt to approach the problem from a statistical point of view. That is not to say there is a lack of quantitative research on how specific demographics tend to vote; indeed, some of the good data and information out there will be used to inform this paper’s hypotheses and econometric model. This study will focus on the 2012 U.S. presidential election Barack Obama and Mitt Romney (there were several other candidates on the ballot, but none received a significant portion of the votes). Pundits threw around seemingly countless factors in an attempt to analyze and predict how people would vote in this election; this paper will focus on a select group of those factors, in hopes of drawing some firm and well-grounded conclusions as to whether they actually played a statistically significant role. Countywide data will be utilized. The recent widespread availability of election results on a county-by-county level, combined with countywide information from the U.S. Census Bureau, allows for a very large number of observations (at least in comparison to statewide data) to be considered. It would be impossible to include in this project every single factor that may affect how an individual votes for the presidency. Here, instead of focusing on attributes of the...
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...Nonlapan Burimsittichai Ungkana Lukkanavej Econ545: Project 1 – Microeconomic Analysis January, 26, 2015 Introduction In the previous years we have been experiencing a shortage on the supply of physicians, issue that according to the projections will not be changing any time soon. Given this situation we could probably already answer the question and risk to say that it is a good idea economy-wise to become a doctor, seeing that at least for the next 10 years the supply will not be anywhere close to satisfy the demand. There’s many factors that affect this increase in demand such as aging of population, the Baby Boomers that want to remain active and look for and use more healthcare as well as the next generations after them. It is also important to mention that an increase on productivity of healthcare could reduce the gap between demand of supply, but after many years and different attempts almost nothing has been achieved, since healthcare has become more and more complex. Here is a little extract from AAMC website talking about the issue of physicians shortage of supply: The number of federally funded residency training positions was capped by Congress in 1997 by the Balanced Budget Act. The 26,000 residency positions available for first year trainees will not be enough to provide training for the students graduating from medical school as early as 2016. In addition, Medicare support of graduate medical education (GME) includes paying its share of the costs of training...
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...Nonlapan Burimsittichai Ungkana Lukkanavej Econ545: Project 1 – Microeconomic Analysis January, 26, 2015 Introduction In the previous years we have been experiencing a shortage on the supply of physicians, issue that according to the projections will not be changing any time soon. Given this situation we could probably already answer the question and risk to say that it is a good idea economy-wise to become a doctor, seeing that at least for the next 10 years the supply will not be anywhere close to satisfy the demand. There’s many factors that affect this increase in demand such as aging of population, the Baby Boomers that want to remain active and look for and use more healthcare as well as the next generations after them. It is also important to mention that an increase on productivity of healthcare could reduce the gap between demand of supply, but after many years and different attempts almost nothing has been achieved, since healthcare has become more and more complex. Here is a little extract from AAMC website talking about the issue of physicians shortage of supply: The number of federally funded residency training positions was capped by Congress in 1997 by the Balanced Budget Act. The 26,000 residency positions available for first year trainees will not be enough to provide training for the students graduating from medical school as early as 2016. In addition, Medicare support of graduate medical education (GME) includes paying its share of the costs...
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...Athens Information Technology Master in Management of Business, Innovation & Technology (MBIT) Management Information Systems E-Health in Greece compared to EU/US and the impact of Big Data in healthcare Prepared by: Athina Klaoudatou Christos Panagiotou Abstract The aim of this report is to describe the eHealth market. The focus is the Greek business landscape, current trends in the market, industry growth, drivers, and restraints, the technologies and the players in various aspects of the field. Data are presented about the evolution of the market and there are descriptions of what Greek companies offer. Moreover implementation measures are presented, along with progress achieved with respect to national and regional eHealth solutions in EU and EEA Member States. Table of Contents 1. The National Health System 1 1.1. Organizational structure 1 1.2. Some facts & figures 1 2. What is eHealth, definitions, areas of application, benefits 5 2.1. What is eHealth 5 2.2. Forms of eHealth 5 2.3. Benefits of eHealth 6 3. eHealth framework in European Union countries 7 3.1. eHealth Action Plan 2012 - 2020 7 3.2. eHealth in the European Countries 8 4. Application of eHealth practices 10 4.1. Electronic Health records (EHR) 10 4.1.1. Examples of current EHR use 10 4.1.2. Electronic Health Record in Greece 12 4.1.3. Summing up 14 4.2. Interoperability 15 4.2.1. Defining Interoperability in Healthcare Systems 15 4.2...
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...SECOND 21ST CENTURY ACADEMIC FORUM CONFERENCE AT HARVARD MARCH 8 - 10, 2015 MARTIN CONFERENCE CENTER HARVARD UNIVERSITY BOSTON, MA USA Teaching, Learning, and Research in the “Just Google It” Age CONFERENCE PROCEEDING VOL. 5, NO.1 ISSN: 2330-1236 Table of Contents Authors Paper Title Page Maryam Abdu Investigating Capital Structure Decisions and Its Effect on the Nigerian Capital Market 1 Norsuhaily Abu Bakar Rahimah Embong Ibrahim Mamat Ruzilawati Abu Bakar Idris Abd. Hamid Holistically Integraded Curriculum: Implications for Personality Development 16 Sandra Ajaps Geography Education in the Google age: A Case Study of Nsukka Local Government Area of Nigeria 30 Helen Afang Andow Impact of Banking Reforms on Service Delivery in the Nigerian Banking Sector 45 Billy Batlegang Green IT Curriculum: A Mechanism For Sustainable Development 59 Rozeta Biçaku-Çekrezi Student Perception of Classroom Management and Productive Techniques in Teaching 74 Thomas J.P.Brady Developing Digital Literacy in Teachers and Students 91 Lorenzo Cherubini Ontario (Canada) Education Provincial Policy: Aboriginal Student Learning 101 Jennifer Dahmen Natascha Compes Just Google It?! But at What Price? Teaching Pro-Environmental Behaviour for Smart and Energy-Efficient Use of Information and Communication Technologies 119 Marion Engin Senem Donanci Using iPads in a dialogic classroom: Mutually exclusive or naturally compatible? 132 Nahed Ghazzoul Teaching and Learning in...
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...AFGE 2013 Issue Papers Table of Contents Another Manufactured Crisis: What’s Next in the Fiscal Showdown………1 Federal Pay……………………………………………………………….…..…..4 Federal Employees’ Health Benefits Program……………………………….15 Official Time for Federal Employee Union Representatives………….........22 Arbitrary Cuts in Civil Servants………………………………………………..26 Sourcing: Complying with the Law……………………………………….......31 Capping Taxpayer-Funded Service Contractor Compensation……………43 Transportation Security Administration and TSOs…………………………..46 Domestic Partnership Benefits……………………………..………………….49 Employment Non-Discrimination Act……………………………………..…..55 Paid Parental Leave………………………………………………..…………..57 One America, Many Voices Act………………………………………….…....60 Department of Veterans Affairs…………………………………..……………62 Department of Defense……………………………...……….………………...71 Federal Prisons………………………………………………………………….90 Social Security Administration ……………………………………….…...…103 National Guard/Reserve Technicians ………………………...……….……108 D.C. Workers’ Issues …………………...……………………………..…..…117 Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. ……………………..……...120 Another Manufactured Crisis: What’s Next in the Fiscal Showdown? Background At the beginning of January, President Obama signed a tax deal that restored higher Clinton-era rates to those making over $450,000, and funded an extension of unemployment insurance benefits to the long-term unemployed, extended for another year the $240 monthly transit subsidy, but did not...
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...Medical Tourism Medical Tourism Introduction Medical tourism is the act of traveling to other countries to obtain medical, dental or cosmetic care. Medical tourism is a new term but thousands of years old act. People have been traveling across the continents in search of cures for any imaginable illnesses and making therapeutic trips for health wellness. In ancient Greece, pilgrims and patients came from all over the Mediterranean to the sanctuary of the healing god, Asklepios at Epidaurus, and from the 18th century wealthy Europeans have been traveling to spas from Germany to the Nile. In recent years, medical tourism is becoming more popular with patients seeking treatment for health and well-being purposes abroad. Medical Tourism is also known as Medical Travel, Health Tourism, Surgical Tourism, Health Travel, Treatment Abroad, Surgeries Abroad, and Medical Outsourcing. Medical Tourism Concerns Though many are eager to be the right pieces in the puzzle, many are still struggling to get the right fit. There are a number of concerns and risk factors for patients getting treatment much less seeking them abroad. Some concerns for patients include a consistent quality of care, lack of extensive dialog between the patient and the doctor, lack of post-op follow up, cultural differences and difficulty in obtaining sufficient insurance coverage. In order to mitigate the risk, it’s essential that the patient works with well reputed facilitators. Medical Tourism Accreditation ...
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