"Health & Medical News"

A California appeals court dealt another blow to health plans over their policy cancellation tactics.

The 4th District Court of Appeal unanimously said insurers have a responsibility to make sure patients’ policy applications are complete and accurate before issuing coverage — not after expensive claims come in the door. Judges said plans cannot revoke patients’ policies unless they fully investigate pre-enrollment forms up front or insurers show patients intentionally misled them.

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Visiting a faith-based addiction treatment program in Baltimore, President George Bush referenced his own past drinking problems in telling program participants, “I understand addiction, and I understand how a changed heart can help you deal with addiction.”

The Associated Press reported Jan. 29 that Bush visited Baltimore’s Jericho Program, a project of Episcopal Family Services of Maryland, and spoke for the second time in as many months about his personal struggle with addiction.

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Anecdotal reports suggest that there are several hundred physicians who are both religious leaders and medical doctors. They see a connection between the physical world of medicine and the spiritual world of faith, a perspective that can cross into the exam room.

This may be a positive quality for patients, said Farr A. Curlin, MD, an internal medicine assistant professorcq at the University of Chicago whose research focuses on spirituality and medicine.

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