The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act's health insurance exchanges will open on Jan. 1, 2014, and likely have an impact on physician income, according to a Medscape News report.
The exchanges will be open online Oct. 1, 2013, designed to allow uninsured people to choose coverage for the next year. According to the report, primary care physicians and specialists could see:
• Lower reimbursement rates from insurance companies participating in the exchange
• Less control over the number of patients from exchanges they see
• Problems collecting out-of-pocket from exchange patients
• Patients who aren't familiar with following treatment regimens
• Formation of narrow networks for insurers, which begin with hospitals and then decide how physicians are included with the potential for "cost profiling"
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