Health Care Legislation Resources

Compiled by Abby Walters, MLIS, Assistant Librarian at  Maslon Edelman Borman & Brand, LLP 

Free Electronic Resources:

American Health Lawyers Association – links to print products, links to health law websites. Some content is members only.

The National Congress of State Legislatures  – a resource for state and federal legislation, they have up to date information on Health Care Reform on the Federal and State level. Includes Fact Sheets on key provisions and mp3 recordings on website.

CBS News -  2010 Health Care Reform bill summary

Cowan, Gunteski & Co -  Highlights from the 2010 Health Care Reform Act

Library of Congress – Thomas -  Bill summary and status for H.R.3590

U.S. Government Printing Office  - Health Care Reform Bill and Debate Available on GPO’s Federal Digital System

Kaiser Family Foundation – details on Federal Health Care reform, timelines, interactive calculator, issue briefs & analysis, State reform information.

AARP Guide to Reform – includes guides for individuals and small business owners

For Fee Electronic Resources

Lexis.com  – Health Care Law Practice Center under the Transactional Advisor Tab

Thomson Reuters EBIA  - need subscription for full access, but has copies of both bills and a free newsletter 

BNA – access to current health news/legislation/analysis to subscribers of healthcare publications or Daily Reports

Books:

• CCH Law, Explanation and Analysis of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
• TAA’s Law Explanation and Analysis
• Lexis/Matthew Bender – Health Care Reform Special Alert (available in June)
• RIA’s complete analysis of the tax and benefits provisions of the 2010 Health Care Act as amended by the 2010 Health Care Reconciliation Act : with Code and ERISA sections as amended and Committee reports
• CCH 2010 tax legislation : Patient Protection and Affordable Care ; Health Care Reconciliation ; HIRE and other recent tax acts : law, explanation and analysis
• CCH Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act; Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 : text of P.L. 111-148, as signed by the President on March 23, 2010; text of P.L. 111-152, as signed by the President on March 30, 2010 : JCT technical explanation of P.L. 111-148 and P.L. 111-152

WolframAlpha Scores Again

I don’t often include search engines in this blog but there is something about Wolfram Alpha that intrigues me.  Self described as a computational knowledge engine, it is more than any search engine that you might use to search across the web. 

I have to admit that I had trouble figuring out how I would use it when I first tried the site.  Not having a mathematical mind (Yes Mom, you were right, I should have studied harder in high school), I don’t often turn to computations unless there is a need.  But then Wolfram Alpha is more than computations.

For example, searching for ibm,microsoft,oracle will provide you with a comparison of the three companies that includes the latest trades, fundamentals & financials (see the image below for a list of the information you can find, recent returns, relative price history, performance comparisons, correlation matrix, projections, and mean-variance optimal portfolio.  Interesting.

Click image to view larger format

On top of finding it useful, while reading the 3 Geeks post, Wolfram Alpha Lets You Build Your Own Personal Widgets, I was excited to learn that you can now build widgets to make searching easier.  While it seems that WordPress doesn’t support this yet, you can click Compare Public Companies to see the widget I built.  If you think it is useful, I would appreciate a rating.  Well, even if you don’t, it would still be great to see it rated.

See the Money & Finance category to find other widgets that are business focused.

CCH Releases IntelliConnect 2.1

If you are lucky to be taking off for a 4th of July holiday, you probably found something new upon return.  I received the following announcement from Wolters Kluwer Law & Business as I am sure many of you have.  A couple items worth noting a:

• Great training presentation is provided that outlines the enhancements in detail.
• List of online training seminars for the product.
• Word document with sample text that can be used to share the news of the change with your users.

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT

Evolving with You as Your Professional Demands ChangeWelcome to IntelliConnect^® 2.1, your new connection to faster, more efficient legal research! The enhanced capabilities and customization tools launching July 4^th weekend allow you and your users to complete research tasks more easily than ever before.

Designed as a living platform, IntelliConnect reflects Wolters Kluwer Law and Business’ ongoing commitment to customer-focused innovation and adaptation to the changing marketplace. We are able to refine IntelliConnect as needed, in response to both evolving user requirements and technological advancements.

Some of the new IntelliConnect enhancements that will roll-out over the July 4^th weekend will support you for an even more streamlined workday, while not affecting the existing functionalities. Coming as a direct result of feedback from customers like you, our new 2.1 enhancements include:

• New Home Page puts key features front and center and opens the Browse Tree by default
• Titles A-Z list for instant access to all of the publications and products in your firm’s subscription
• Faster and easier to find tools for setting up Practice Areas
• ‘Relate’ link allowing targeted selection of related tax documents
• Larger/Adjustable fonts
• Ability to select and print text
• More intuitive way to save and use Favorite content sets
• Intelligent post-search filters remember your prior selection
• More search tabs (up to eight)

For specific details on these and other features in this release, go to:  https://www.brainshark.com/WKLB/IC-R2

For more feature specific user support references and videos go to the IntelliConnect training site at http://www.tax.cchgroup.com/LMG-IC or register for IntelliConnect July 2010 Enhancements training at http://inter.viewcentral.com/reg/cchlegal/ICJuly2010.

For any customer support questions, call (800) 344-3734 or go to http://support.cch.com

Interested in sharing enhancement updates with your users? Download a draft email that you can customize and share with your IntelliConnect users at http://business.cch.com/brochures/useremailR2.doc

Attending AALL meeting? Stop by the Wolters Kluwer Law & Business booth (#805-905) for a demo of the 2.1 features by the product development team of Michael Asen and Scott Murray. IntelliConnect 3.0 is currently in development and scheduled for release at the end of 2010. See and discuss the direction of IntelliConnect with Michael and Scott. IntelliConnect demonstration schedule is available at the booth or check out the Sunday issue of AALL’s Summit News Daily Newspaper at the conference.

We are confident that once you and your users experience our latest version of IntelliConnect, you’ll find that it takes legal research to a whole new level.

Wolters Kluwer Law & Business