Eligibility & Enrollment
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How the New Medicaid/CHIP Managed Care Regulations Seek to Improve Network Adequacy and Access to Services
Thanks to a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, CCF has teamed up with NHeLP to launch a series of explainer briefs that unpack the new Medicaid/CHIP managed care regulations. Three briefs in the series have been released already: Looking at the New Medicaid/CHIP Managed Care Regulations Through a Children’s Lens, Medicaid/CHIP Managed Care…
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CMS Approves Arizona Plan to Re-Open CHIP (KidsCare)
Today, Arizona “officially” joined the rest of the country as CMS approved its plan to re-open its CHIP plan. As Say Ahhh! readers know, new enrollment in Arizona’s CHIP plan (KidsCare) was frozen for several years. Now children living in all 50 states and DC will have the opportunity to sign up for CHIP coverage.…
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Medicaid Expansion Helps Kids by Helping Moms Get Care for Maternal Depression
By Joan Alker and Olivia Golden Today, CLASP and the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families (CCF) are releasing a new report on the important but often-overlooked link between adult health care coverage and children’s healthy development – specifically, the connection between health care coverage and identifying and treating maternal depression, so that children…
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How the New Medicaid/CHIP Managed Care Regulations Enhance the Beneficiary Experience
Thanks to a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, CCF has teamed with NHeLP to launch a series of explainer briefs to unpack the new Medicaid/CHIP managed care regulations. Two briefs in the series have been released: Looking at the New Medicaid/CHIP Managed Care Regulations Through a Children’s Lens and Medicaid/CHIP Managed Care Rules: Improving Consumer…
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Florida and Utah Remove 5-Year Wait for Legal Immigrant Children
July 1 will be a great day for children living in Florida and Utah as the five-year Medicaid/CHIP waiting period for legal immigrant children will be eliminated. Now 30 states and DC have accepted the Immigrant Children’s Health Improvement Act (ICHIA) option passed into law as part of the reauthorization of CHIP in 2009. (Note:…
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Using Data to Document and Improve EPSDT Participation
For the second part of our series on EPSDT, we’ll turn our attention to data. If you missed the first part, go back for a moment to catch up before continuing. CMS-416 The official federal data source for EPSDT is the CMS-416 form. States are required to use this form to report EPSDT data to…
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Thanks to Improvements Made After Hurricane Katrina, Louisiana is Better-Prepared for a Medicaid Enrollment Boost
By A.J. Custer Starting July 1st, low-income adults in Louisiana will gain health insurance benefits, as the state officially becomes the 31st state to expand Medicaid. Enrollment has already begun and the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals predicts an estimated 375,000 people will enroll in Louisiana’s Medicaid program over the next year. The program…
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Kentucky’s Proposed Waiver Could Undermine its Successful Medicaid Expansion
By Sean Miskell and Adam Searing Kentucky has released a new Medicaid waiver request for state public comment today. This proposal would allow the state to make significant changes to its existing Medicaid program, affecting not only those newly eligible beneficiaries currently receiving health care through Kentucky’s existing Medicaid expansion, but also others served by…
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How the New Medicaid/CHIP Managed Care Regulations Improve Consumer Information
As my colleague, Kelly Whitener, announced last week, thanks to a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, CCF has teamed with NHeLP to launch a series of explainer briefs to unpack the new Medicaid/CHIP managed care regulations. The first brief, Looking at the New Medicaid/CHIP Regulations Through a Children’s Lens, was published last week.…
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Study: Medicaid Offers Stronger Cost Sharing Protections Compared with Marketplace Coverage
By Sean Miskell When we consider the effects of state decisions not to expand Medicaid, we rightfully focus much of our attention on those that are locked out of coverage. However, a new study by researchers at the Commonwealth Fund considers the experience of consumers above the poverty line that are eligible for subsidized Marketplace…
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A Missed Opportunity to Learn from Wisconsin’s Health Reform Implementation
By Jon Peacock, Wisconsin Council on Children and Families Wisconsin received a federal waiver to make significant changes to BadgerCare in 2014, and one of the conditions of that “demonstration waiver” was that the state would evaluate the effects of the policy changes. A national health policy expert, Sara Rosenbaum, reviewed the planned evaluation and…
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Fact Sheet: Medicaid’s Role for Children
Medicaid is an essential source of health coverage for the nation’s children. The program provides health coverage to children and parents in low-income families who lack access to affordable private health insurance, as well as to children with special health care needs.
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California Moves Toward Offering Full Price Coverage to Ineligible Immigrants in its Marketplace
Governor Brown recently signed into law SB 10, a bill that requires Covered California—the state’s health insurance marketplace—to request a waiver from the federal government to allow immigrants who are currently ineligible to purchase marketplace coverage. If the waiver is granted, immigrants who are not lawfully present would be allowed to purchase health coverage at…
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How Did Arizona Reach a Bipartisan Agreement to Re-open KidsCare?
By Joe Fu, Children’s Action Alliance of Arizona After six years without KidsCare, Arizona will no longer be the only state in the country without a functioning Children’s Health Insurance (CHIP) program. With bipartisan support, Arizona’s Legislature pushed through a measure to reinstate KidsCare in the final moments of the session. On May 6, 2016, Arizona’s…
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Six States Hold the Key to Reaching Nearly Half of the Uninsured Kids Who Are Eligible for Medicaid/CHIP
By Genevieve M. Kenney, Jennifer Haley, Clare Pan, Victoria Lynch, and Matthew Buettgens, Urban Institute, Funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation We recently examined how children’s coverage fared during the first year of implementation of the major coverage provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). We found increases in participation in Medicaid and the Children’s…
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New CMS Guidance Highlights Policy Options for Screening and Treating Maternal Depression
By Stephanie Schmit and Christina Walker, Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) The U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released an Informational Bulletin (IB) highlighting the critical role Medicaid can play in supporting state policy choices to promote young children’s healthy development through maternal depression screening and treatment. The guidance in the…
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Comprehensive Coverage for Children in California—Regardless of Immigration Status—Begins Today
Today is great day for kids in California. All children in California now—regardless of their immigration status—have access to free or low cost, comprehensive, health coverage if their family income is at or below 266 percent of the federal poverty level (about $53,625 for a family of three). According to the Berkeley Labor Center, up to…
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New Georgetown Report: Understanding the Consumer Enrollment Experience in the Affordable Care Act Marketplaces
Georgetown University’s Center on Health Insurance Reforms released a report this week, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, that provides new insights into the many challenges facing consumers and those tasked with assisting them when enrolling into coverage through the Affordable Care Act (ACA) marketplaces. The findings can help policymakers better understand the kinds of systemic…
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New Study Confirms that ACA Welcome Mat for Kids was Indeed Welcoming
My favorite study from our wonderful colleagues at the Urban Institute has just been released, and it underscores that the sharp reduction in the uninsured rate for children was closely linked to the ACA. The study, like others before it (including our own) documents the decline in the number of uninsured children to historic lows…
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Recent Changes to the Free Care Rule Put Federal Funds Back on the Table
The so-called “Free Care Rule” prevented states from receiving federal Medicaid funds to provide any service that is ordinarily provided for free to the community at large, even if Medicaid would cover these services for its beneficiaries. For instance, if a public school nurse were to examine a student, federal funds could not be used…
