X

Rural Health

  • Analysis of Ohio’s report on Medicaid expansion

    CCFadmin

    On Tuesday, August 21, the Ohio Department of Medicaid (ODM) released the second “assessment” of the Medicaid expansion as a follow-up to the first, General Assembly required, assessment from 2016. In this document the ODM found the following: EMPLOYMENT Employment for enrollees went up 15%, meaning 1 in 2 expansion enrollees are working The most common reason for…

  • Summary of Mississippi’s Revised Section 1115 Medicaid Waiver Proposal

    CCFadmin

    Overview: A revised version of Mississippi’s Section 1115 waiver proposal, which seeks to condition Medicaid eligibility on compliance with a work/community engagement requirement for very low-income parents/caregivers, has been re-opened by the federal government for public comment. Comments on the waiver, known as the “Mississippi Workforce Training Initiative,” are due by August 18, 2018. The…

  • Oklahoma’s Proposed Work Rule Would Harm Mothers and Children

    Joan Alker

    Oklahoma has one of the highest uninsured rates for children in the nation, and the state will likely make matters worse if it gets a green light from CMS to go through with a plan to impose more red tape requirements on poor parents. Oklahoma is seeking approval to amend its Section 1115 demonstration waiver…

  • Proposed Fix to Harmful Medicaid Waivers Impacting Very Poor Parents in Alabama and Mississippi is no Fix at All

    Joan Alker

    Both Alabama and Mississippi have submitted Medicaid Section 1115 waiver proposals that would impose work/community engagement requirements rules on poor parents and caregivers. Because these states have not expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act and have some of them most restrictive eligibility limits in the nation, most people facing loss of health coverage due…

  • Perry County to Tuscaloosa: A 70-Minute Drive for Rural Women Seeking Obstetrics Care

    Allexa Gardner

    I have driven the 57 miles from Perry County, Alabama to Tuscaloosa many times, with long stretches of bumpy road that is marred by stop lights as you get closer to the city. All in all it’s about a 70-minute drive, a 70-minute drive residents of Perry County have to make if they need to…

  • Update: State Data on Health Coverage in Small Towns and Rural Areas, 2015/16

    CCFadmin

    The state-specific downloads in the table below show county-level data on Medicaid coverage and uninsurance for the time periods 2008/09 and 2015/16. Uninsurance rates for seniors are not presented because they are so low. Delaware, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and the District of Columbia are excluded because less than 2 percent of their residents live in counties…

  • Medicaid Expansion Brings Improvements in Coverage and Utilization to Rural CHC Patients

    Karina Wagnerman

    We previously blogged on research showing that the Medicaid expansion helps keep rural hospitals open and that the Medicaid expansion disproportionately benefited rural communities. We came to a similar conclusion in our own research when we analyzed Medicaid coverage in small towns and rural America. We found that the rate of uninsured adults in expansion…

  • South Carolina’s Medicaid Proposal Will Harm Children and Families

    Joan Alker

    South Carolina is the latest state to consider imposing a work requirement on parents receiving Medicaid. While there’s no formal proposal yet, officials have outlined their plans in a concept paper that raises as many questions as it answers. In a report we released today, we outline the problems with imposing a work requirement in…

  • Why Virginia Expanded Medicaid: Five Key Reasons

    Adam Searing

    Virginia decided today to expand Medicaid, which will allow the state to start to cover approximately 400,000 people who are unable to afford health plans yet too poor to get tax credit subsidies to buy insurance. This is a significant win for Virginians and for bipartisan cooperation in an increasingly partisan age as a newly-elected…

  • Kansas Legislators Reject a New Barrier to Medicaid Coverage for Very Poor Parents and CMS Just Might Agree

    Joan Alker

    At CCF we have been doing a lot of work lately trying to educate folks about who exactly is impacted by Medicaid waivers that create new barriers to coverage in states that have not accepted the option to expand Medicaid. As our recent reports on Alabama and Mississippi show, these work requirement proposals will result…

  • Mississippi’s Proposed Medicaid Work Rule Would Disproportionately Harm Mothers Living in Small Towns and Rural Areas of State

    Joan Alker

    Mississippi’s request for a Medicaid work requirement has emerged as the one to watch. Its section 1115 waiver is now awaiting federal action and could well be the test of whether states that have never accepted the Medicaid expansion can impose this sort of requirement on their most vulnerable parents. CCF, working with the Mississippi…

  • Alabama Mothers and Children Will Bear the Brunt of Proposed Medicaid Restrictions

    Joan Alker

    As regular readers of SayAhhh! know, on January 11th CMS released guidance announcing its interest in approving state proposals to impose work requirements on Medicaid beneficiaries. Since then CMS has approved three waivers to do so (along with other important and harmful changes such as lockouts which we are not talking about today) – Kentucky,…

  • Proposed Medicaid Work Requirement: Impact on Alabama’s Low-Income Families with Children

    CCFadmin

    Alabama’s plan to impose a work requirement on parents receiving Medicaid could cost as many as 8,700 people their health coverage in the first year alone, affecting mainly mothers whose children also would feel the impact, according to a new analysis by the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families and Arise Citizens’ Policy Project.…

  • Medicaid Is Rural America’s Financial Midwife

    News Article

    Shefali Luthra, Kaiser Health News ZANESVILLE, Ohio — Brianna Foster, 23, lives minutes away from Genesis Hospital, the main source of health care and the only hospital with maternity services in southeastern Ohio’s rural Muskingum County. Proximity proved potentially lifesaving last fall when Foster, pregnant with her second child, Holden, felt contractions at 31 weeks —…

  • Study Documents How Medicaid Expansion Helps Keep Rural Hospitals Open

    Adam Searing

    Comprehensive research in the journal Health Affairs was recently published looking at the effect of state Medicaid expansions on hospital closures. Focusing on especially rural hospitals, the authors conducted a comprehensive and sophisticated analysis, finding: “[T]he ACA’s Medicaid expansion was associated with improved hospital financial performance and substantially lower likelihoods of closure, especially in rural…

  • Research: Medicaid Expansions Help Parents, Children and Families Get Coverage, Afford Care, Reduce Debt

    Adam Searing

    Recently Seema Verma, the Trump Administration’s director of Medicare and Medicaid, said that Medicaid provides “a card without care.” This line echoes state critics of Medicaid like Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin who recently said: “One of the most remarkable lies that has perpetrated in recent years in the healthcare community in America is that expanded…

  • Research: Coverage and Medicaid Expansion Effects on Parents and Children

    Adam Searing

    Comprehensive Overview of Multiple Studies The Effects of Medicaid Expansion under the ACA: Updated Findings from a Literature Review [note]Larisa Antonisse, Rachel Garfield, Robin Rudowitz and Samantha Artiga, Kaiser Family Foundation, Sep 25, 2017.[/note] A 2017 update of the broadest review currently published, this comprehensive look at 153 studies comparing Medicaid expansion and non-expansion states…

  • New Research: Medicaid Expansions Increase Coverage More in Rural Areas than in Urban Areas

    Adam Searing

    Rural areas and small towns across America have special problems accessing health care. Our colleagues at the University of North Carolina’s Rural Health Program have tracked the increasing numbers of rural hospital closures around the country. The Rural Health Information Hub is also a great resource on the opportunities and challenges for rural health delivery…

  • Report: Children in Rural Communities More Likely to Rely on CHIP and Medicaid

    CCFadmin

    The challenges that students face in many rural places are staggering. Limited access to advanced coursework, medical care, food, and employment opportunities continue to daunt students in many rural communities. Poverty rates are also climbing. In 23 states, a majority of rural students live in low-income households; this is a noticeable uptick from 2013 when…

  • Trump Administration’s New Medicaid Waiver Policy Will Increase Number of Uninsured: Kentucky Likely to be First Approved

    Joan Alker

    I was in Kentucky last week where I spoke to an audience of health care providers and advocates about the success of the state’s Medicaid expansion and the giant step backwards its pending waiver proposal would be. I was relieved that the state’s pending waiver proposal wasn’t approved while I was there as my trip…