Healthcare update

Repeal vs. reform

Regulations, not repeal votes, will decide the future of the health-care law

In Pursuit of a Mind Map, Slice by Slice

Dr. Lichtman and his team of researchers at Harvard have built some unusual contraptions that carve off slivers of mouse brains as part of a quest to understand how the mind works. Their goal is to run slice after minuscule slice under a powerful electron microscope, develop detailed pictures of the brain’s complex wiring and then stitch the images back together. In short, they want to build a full map of the mind.

The field, at a very nascent stage, is called connectomics, and the neuroscientists pursuing it compare their work to early efforts in genetics. What they are doing, these scientists say, is akin to trying to crack the human genome — only this time around, they want to find how memories, personality traits and skills are stored.

They want to find a connectome, or the mental makeup of a person.

“You are born with your genes, and they don’t change afterward,” said H. Sebastian Seung, a professor of computational neuroscience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who is working on the computer side of connectomics. “The connectome is a product of your genes and your experiences. It’s where nature meets nurture.”

Mandates don't stay modest, a continuing series

Should health insurers have to cover treatment of Lyme disease? What about speech therapy for autistic children? Or infertility treatments?

Can they limit the number of chemotherapy rounds allowed cancer patients? Or restrict the type of dialysis offered to people with kidney disease?

This week an independent advisory group convened by the Obama administration launched what is likely to be a long and emotional process to answer such questions...

Under the health-care overhaul law, beginning in 2014 all new insurance plans for individuals and small businesses will have to include a package of minimum "essential benefits" falling into 10 general categories - ranging from hospitalization, to prescription drugs, to rehabilitative and habilitative services. But Congress largely left it to Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius to decide how detailed to make the essential benefits package and what exactly to put in it.

Regulations, not repeal votes, will decide the future of the health-care law

On the Border, Long Lives Despite Dismal Statistics

With House debate set, up to half of people under 65 have preexisting conditions

Blue Shield's defiance over rate increases shows the need to give the insurance commissioner some real authority over health insurance premiums

More Young People Winding Up In Nursing Homes