Can’t Sleep? Blame the Moon

It may sound far-fetched, however Swiss researchers have revealed a study demonstrating that the standard of sleep will modification with satellite cycles. Investigators at the University of Basel analyzed the sleep of over thirty volunteers in 2 age teams within the sleep research lab. whereas study participants were asleep, the analysis team monitored brain patterns, eye movements and measured internal secretion secretions. once reviewing all the information, the study team complete that each the subjective and objective perception of sleep quality modified with the section of the moon. Of note, they found that round the time of a full-of-the-moon, brain activity in areas associated with deep sleep reduced by thirty p.c which participants took 5 minutes longer to go to sleep, and slept for twenty minutes but usual. Tests additionally showed lower blood levels of the sleep regulation internal secretion endocrine once the moon was full. trendy life and electrical lights might habitually mask the moon’s influence on US, however within the controlled surroundings of the laboratory, the results of the moon come into sight and measurable, the investigators complete.

Why Walk to Work?

If you walk, ride a bike or take public transportation to work, you’re less likely to be overweight compared to people who drive to work or take a taxi. You’re also 17 percent less likely to have high blood pressure. And walkers are 40 percent less likely to have diabetes. These findings come from a British survey of 20,000 people across the UK. Researchers at Imperial College London and University College London determined that 19 percent of working age adults who drove, taxied or rode a motorbike to work were obese compared to 15 percent of those who walked and 13 percent of those who rode their bikes. The survey showed that cyclists were about half as likely to have diabetes as drivers, and that transport to work varied widely with location within the UK. For example, in London 52 percent of those surveyed used public transportation, while only five percent did in Northern Ireland.

What Eating Grapes Says About Your Diet

If you or your kids snack on grapes or raisins and sip 100 percent grape juice, your diet is likely to be healthier than most. A new analysis of the diets of more than 21,800 children and adults suggests that grape eaters have a pretty healthy all-around diet – in general they eat more vegetables, whole grains, nuts and seeds than those who don’t eat grapes, and they consume less added sugar, total fat, saturated fat and cholesterol. The report was based on data gathered from the 2003 to 2008 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. It showed that grape consumers had increased intake of vitamins A, C and B6, fiber, calcium and potassium. In other news about grapes, an animal study at the University of Michigan showed that eating grapes can reduce heart failure associated with chronic high blood pressure by increasing the activity of several genes responsible for antioxidant defense in the heart tissue.

My take? The only downside to the news that eating grapes is a marker for good nutrition is the fact that grapes perennially make the Environmental Working Group’s list of the “Dirty Dozen Plus” - a ranking of fruits and vegetables that have high pesticide loads. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t eat grapes – they are good for you - but it does mean that they’re one of the fresh produce items you should always buy organic.

Federal health exchange sending confusing enrollment information to insurers

The federal health-care exchange that opened a dozen days ago is marred by snags beyond the widely publicized computer gridlock that has thwarted Americans trying to buy a health plan. Even when consumers have been able to sign up, insurers sometimes can’t tell who their new customers are because of a separate set of computer defects.

The problems stem from a feature of the online marketplace’s computer system that is designed to send each insurer a daily report listing people who have just enrolled. According to several insurance industry officials, the reports are sometimes confusing and duplicative. In some cases, they show — correctly or not — that the same person enrolled and canceled several times on a single day.

The ability of consumers to sign up for a health plan, and the ability of the insurers to know who they are covering, is key to the success of the federal law that will for the first time require most Americans to have health insurance starting Jan. 1. The Web site www.healthcare.gov is the main path for millions of Americans in 36 states to purchase new coverage.

The flawed enrollment reports illustrate that the site is bedeviled by problems that go beyond what the Obama administration has acknowledged in explaining the creaky performance of the exchange so far.

At the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services, officials have portrayed the exchange as a victim of its own popularity, with a larger-than-expected crush of Americans rushing to a Web site that wasn’t built to accommodate so many people at once.

That explanation puts the focus up front — on the servers and software that help consumers take the first step of registering for an account. Evidence is emerging from the insurance industry and elsewhere, however, that the exchange also has flaws that show up further along in the process — as consumers try to check whether they qualify for federal subsidies and as insurers try to find out who has enrolled.

For instance, one major insurance carrier, Cigna, sent a notice Wednesday to insurance brokers instructing them to wait until November to try to sign up customers who might qualify for a subsidy, according to Joseph Mondy, a Cigna spokesman. He said that the company does not yet trust the reliability of the part of the exchange that is supposed to calculate the tax credits that will, for the first time, help some Americans pay for private health coverage.

Cigna is one of the insurers that has built its own online “portal” for brokers to use, but that portal must communicate with the federal exchange to find out about a potential subsidy.

Cigna is selling health plans via the federal exchange in four states: Arizona, Florida, Tennessee and Texas. Mondy said the carrier has seen “multiple enrollments” coming through for the same customer on the same day.

A Blue Cross Blue Shield plan in a Southern state said that it has also gotten simultaneous reports of the same consumers enrolling as of Jan. 1 and cancelling as of Dec. 31, 2014.

“It’s a glitch that . . . needs to be fixed,” said a spokesman for the plan, who, like most insurers interviewed, spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid antagonizing the Obama administration.

Compounding the confusion, these electronic enrollment files are missing a critical element that they were built to include: a time stamp that would let a health plan track whether a consumer’s last step on the site was to actually sign up.

Insurers are uncertain of the cause of the flaws, with some speculating that the exchange cannot consolidate consumers’ moves through the Web site as they shop for and ultimately choose a health plan. Others say the problem could be unrelated software errors.

Federal health officials declined to discuss the problem with the enrollment reports. “As individual problems are raised by insurers, we work aggressively to address them,” said Brian Cook, a spokesman for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the branch of HHS that is overseeing the insurance exchange.

Meanwhile, the government has tweaked the exchange to deal with the initial problem — accessing the heavily used site — to try to make it easier for shoppers to obtain information without going through the sometimes cumbersome process of registering for an account.

Starting Thursday, a new tool points consumers more directly to a list of the health plans in their community and sample prices. Before, this information was on the site only in an Excel spreadsheet that was hard to find and to understand.

Obama administration officials insisted that this was not a major change to the Web site, because consumers still need to create an account to find out about subsidies and the specific costs of various health plans for people their age.

The initial bottleneck that prevented people from getting onto the site has cleared to some degree. And the seriousness of insurers’ trouble with the enrollment reports will depend on how long the problem persists.

The exchange’s enrollment period lasts for six months starting Oct. 1. Plans start to take effect Jan. 1.

One insurance industry official familiar with the daily reports, known as “834s,” said that they rely on relatively old technology.

Rather than transmitting a file whenever a consumer enrolls, the reports are sent to each insurance carrier in a daily batch at 6 p.m.

Also, the reports contain a “stack” for each consumer, so that if a person picks a health plan, then retypes his or her phone number, two reports are generated.

Beginning in December, health officials intend to run a monthly comparison of the federal list of enrollees against the insurers’ lists. However, one insurance industry official said that the computer system needed to perform that comparison has not been tested.

The flawed enrollment reports result from one of several design and programming issues that have been emerging in recent days, according to technology consultants, health-care advocates and academics who have been monitoring the rollout of the exchange.

For some consumers, the confusion begins with the screen that lets them create a user name.

It asks users to “Choose a user name that is 6-74 characters long and must contain a lowercase or capital letter, a number, or one of these symbols _.@/-”. It has been unclear to some whether they need a letter plus a number or symbol, or whether letters or numbers or symbols are sufficient.

Some consumers are discovering they cannot erase profiles they created by mistake, while others are encountering error messages telling them that profiles they created do not exist. Still others find that when they click on a button to move to another screen, they cannot tell whether the system is stuck or simply slow, because the site does not show them an hourglass or any other sign that a step is underway.

James Turner, a software engineer from Derry, N.H., said he has spent seven hours since Oct. 2 trying to enroll but keeps encountering issues that make have made it impossible for him to complete the application. Turner, 51, one of a number of software engineers who have written online critiques of the system, said the most infuriating one involves his wife. According to the system, he said, “I have four spouses.”

He said it has been impossible to delete the phantom family members from his profile.

Some Americans, however, are managing to enroll. Norbert Crabtree, 46, an accounting consultant in South Carolina, logged on to healthcare.gov at 4:30 a.m. Tuesday and finished enrolling about 90 minutes later. The main hitch, he said, was that “they were asking me security questions about a street I lived on 20 years ago. I got that wrong and got kicked out once.”

After a second pass through the security questions, Crabtree said he “swept through” the rest of the application. He enrolled in a plan from Blue Cross Blue Shield with a $450 monthly premium.

He tried calling the insurer shortly afterward, but a representative told him they didn’t yet have enrollment data.

The next morning, someone from the insurer called to say that he was, in fact, enrolled.

Source

7 Best Health and Safety Management Plans for Companies

How Business will Keep Workman’s Compensations price Down

Many corporations of late struggle to stay their Workman’s Comp. costs down. when watching the chart you'll have some general concepts and price saving tips to assist with the “cost cutting” downside. however are you able to management your compensation costs?

One plan to regulate your prices is to form and utilize a “return to work” program. this concept brings the worker back to figure, before they'd have originally been ready to. once an lac worker returns to figure, they're doing thus at an earlier rate than expected as a result of a lighter work load or lighter responsibilities. an example would be; if an injury happens like an outsized cut or laceration and therefore the worker loses the uses of one hand (temporarily), they may be brought back to a smaller work load and given a task or job that doesn't need the utilization of 2 hands. once this observe is deep-rooted, the corporate saves on workman’s compensation costs/ and or claims in addition because the worker making the most of staying actively utilized and salaried.