Newest items in bold

Policy Papers

NASHP Spells Out CHIP’s Lessons for Health Reform—The National Academy for State Health Policy worked with CHIP directors to identify how national health care reform can build on the success and experience of CHIP.  The paper includes some great messaging for talking about CHIP as a successful public program that should be a model for kids coverage under health reform.

NASHP Reports on Medical Home and Quality Improvement–The National Academy for State Health Policy examined the practices of the leading states on the implementation of medical home in Medicaid and CHIP as well as quality improvement efforts on the part of states.

The Southern Institute’s Report on the Retention Initiative–The Southern Institute conducted an initiative in eight states to study and support best practices for retaining children and adults in Medicaid and CHIP. A new report shares the findings of the project with the intent of improving retention across all states.

New Jersey Outreach Working Group Report–A Working Group of state officials, advocates, health plans, and contractors examined outreach, enrollment, and retention efforts for children in New Jersey. The work group found that states that are most successful in enrolling and retaining eligible children in their public health insurance programs employ multi-prong, creative approaches in their outreach and enrollment efforts and have an efficient, coordinated IT system.

Rules of the Road: How an Insurance Exchange Can Pool Risk and Protect Enrollees — The health insurance exchange has emerged as a central concept in several state health reform efforts as well as in active proposals for national health reform.  A new paper from CBPP explains the benefits of an exchange and how a national exchange should be structured to best serve enrollees.

Research Papers

State Choices and the Financial Burden on Families with Special Needs Children–In December 2009, the journal Pediatrics published a study that examined how states’ Medicaid and CHIP eligibility levels affects the financial burden faced by families with children with special health care needs.  It found that families living in states with higher Medicaid and CHIP income-eligibility guidelines were less likely to have high absolute burden and high relative burden.

The Costs of Doing Nothing—The Center for American Progress has estimated the cost—both nationally and by state—due to the lost productivity and shortened lifespans of the uninsured.

Researched published in March 2009 the journal Pediatrics found that young children covered by Medicaid or CHIP had access to care similar to that of privately insured children.  In addition, it found that even short periods of uninsurance led to more delays in needed care and that longer periods of uninsurance were associated with a range of access challenges

Maximizing Kids Enrollment in Medicaid and SCHIP: What Works in Reaching, Enrolling and Retaining Eligible Children. The National Academy for State Health Policy serves as the national program office for the Maximizing Enrollment for Kids grant program. NASHP reviewed the research literature and interviewed key state and national experts to determine which strategies have been identified through research, experience and expert opinion to be most effective in helping states identify, enroll and retain eligible children.

Health Affairs published a study of the effects of Missouri’s 2005 cuts to Medicaid. The authors found a major increase in the numbers of uninsured people, greater uncompensated care burden on hospitals, and revenue shortfalls that forced community health centers to obtain larger state grants and charge patients more. Read the February 2009 study.