President Donald Trump followed through on a months-old promise to declare a national public health emergency on the opioid addiction epidemic, which could increase access to addiction treatment and additional training for physicians prescribing opioids.

According to a new study from Lightning Bolt, providers of automated physician scheduling, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) could save $1.6 billion annually if the organization could balance patient and physician volumes.

The most popular health plans on the Affordable Care Act (ACA)’s exchanges, silver-level plans, will require 34 percent higher premiums on average in 2018, according to an analysis from Avalere Health. The average hike for the second-lowest-priced silver plans, often considered the benchmark for the exchanges, will be 38 percent.

Vox reporter Sarah Kliff has asked patients to submit their emergency room bills from 2012 through 2017 for a project focused on secretive hospital prices and facility fees. This request has caught the attention of the American Hospital Association (AHA), which sent out a memo alerting its members about the project.

A federal judge in California denied the request of 19 attorneys general to force the immediate reinstatement of the Affordable Care Act (ACA)’s cost-sharing reduction subsidies to insurers, which were cut off by President Donald Trump.

Researchers from the University of California, San Diego have developed a machine learning tool to sort through Twitter to identify tweets illegally selling prescription opioids online, according to a study published in the American Journal of Public Health.

According to a study to be presented at the 2017 Palliative and Supportive Care in Oncology Symposium, patients prefer physicians communicate with them face-to-face with a notepad rather than being on the computer.

Two of the top operators of urgent care centers have entered into a definitive agreement to combine their urgent care business into one of the largest in the industry.