Health Insurance

The Open Enrollment Period for purchasing health insurance on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) Marketplace is usually only from November 1 - December 15, unless you experience a qualifying life event. But this year, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Biden Administration opened up a Special Enrollment Period so Americans would have the…

Someone in the U.S. is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease every 65 seconds; in 2020, it was estimated that 5.8 million Americans aged 65 or older had the condition. These startling statistics are made all the more unsettling by the fact that there is currently no known cure, and few effective treatments, for the disease. But…

As of June 17, the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare, is still intact, and the long, drawn-out fights over the legislation seem to be at an end. The ACA survived its third major Supreme Court challenge with a 7-2 decision in its favor, meaning the comprehensive health care reform law will continue…

August is Children’s Eye Health and Safety Awareness Month, so let’s all take a moment and think about when we last took our children to the optometrist to get their eyes checked. If you’re like a lot of parents, you might not have taken them in a long time, or even ever, if they’ve never…

Getting your child ready for college can be an exciting and scary time. You’re preparing them to leave your home and venture out on their own, and you might be experiencing a whirlwind of emotions as they prepare to separate from you, gain their independence and make new friends. Not only that, but you’ll be…

Is your child showing signs of motor delays? If so, this could be an early warning sign of a serious medical condition known as spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), a rare neuromuscular disease that causes the muscles to become weak and waste away. Approximately 10,000 to 25,000 children and adults have spinal muscular atrophy in the…

Are you experiencing dry, scaly, or itchy skin? And have you been hoping that it will eventually go away on its own? Well, if it’s not going away on its own, but is persistent, you might have a skin condition like psoriasis or eczema. These two similar conditions, which both cause rashes, are very common:…

Are you feeling fuller after eating than you used to, or are you often bloated? While these symptoms could mean a lot of things, they are some of the common signs of gastroparesis, a condition marked by partial paralysis of the stomach, which leads to difficulties emptying food in a normal way. This condition is…

The dreaded OB/GYN appointment. For many women, seeing the gynecologist is just plain  nerve-wracking. You want it to be over and done with, and you also might get hung up beforehand on things that don’t matter; for example, the majority of us make sure that we shave our legs and bikini area to try and…

UnitedHealthcare, the country’s largest health insurance company, is looking to crack down on unnecessary emergency room visits with a new policy, which was originally set to go into effect on July 1st. The insurance carrier is planning to begin scrutinizing all emergency room claims to determine if they are actually medical emergencies; if these claims…

Your kidneys serve a very important purpose: they flush out the toxins from your body, removing waste from your blood, which gets turned into urine. But if there is too much waste and not enough fluid in your blood, the waste can stick in your kidney, creating clumps, otherwise known as kidney stones. These stones…

Did you know that approximately 1 in 500 Americans are living with a stoma, or a surgical opening in the body created for the discharge of bodily waste? According to the United Ostomy Association, more than 500,000 Americans have had an ostomy, which is surgery that creates a stoma in order to treat certain diseases…

Cancer is a scary word, and rightly so: an estimated 1,898,160 new cases of cancer will be diagnosed in the United States this year, and 608,570 people will die from the disease in that same time. But while most of us know that cancer is common, and that it can be deadly, many of us…

In January, President Biden signed an executive order that opened up an ACA Special Enrollment Period, allowing people to sign up for health insurance outside of the usual Open Enrollment Period (November 1 - December 15). This Special Enrollment Period, which began on February 15 and will run through August 15 of this year, is…

President Biden recently signed the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) into law, which expanded access to health insurance subsidies to more Americans. These expanded subsidies, which became available on April 1, 2021, are making premiums more affordable to millions of people, saving many hundreds of dollars a year. Eligibility, though, depends on your income, so…

Did you know that nearly 1 in 3 children in the U.S. are infected with cytomegalovirus (CMV) before the age of 5? According to the CDC, around 1 out of every 200 babies is born with congenital CMV, with many having long-term health problems because of it. Like shingles, the cytomegalovirus remains in the body…

Having thick skin can be a positive thing if we’re talking about how well you respond to criticism, but what about having actual thick skin? Thick skin could be a sign of an autoimmune rheumatic disease known as scleroderma. June is National Scleroderma Awareness Month, so to better understand this rare condition, we’re going to…

There is finally light at the end of the long and dreary pandemic tunnel, as more and more adults get vaccinated against Covid-19. Case numbers are falling, and now recent studies are showing that the vaccines are effective against two Covid variants circulating in the country. Because of this hopeful news, the Centers for Disease…