Dataset Information

Multimethod evaluation of health policy change: an application to Medicaid managed care in a rural state.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

To answer questions about the impacts of Medicaid managed care (MMC) at the individual, organizational/community, and population levels of analysis.

Data sources/study setting

Multimethod approach to study MMC in New Mexico, a rural state with challenging access barriers.

Study design

Individual level: surveys to assess barriers to care, access, utilization, and satisfaction. Organizational/community level: ethnography to determine changes experienced by safety net institutions and local communities. Population level: analysis of secondary databases to examine trends in preventable adverse sentinel events.

Data collection/extraction methods

Survey

multivariate statistical methods, including factor analysis and logistic regression. Ethnography: iterative coding and triangulation to assess documents, field observations, and in-depth interviews. Secondary databases: plots of sentinel events over time.

Principal findings

The survey component revealed no consistent changes after MMC, relatively favorable experiences for Medicaid patients, and persisting access barriers for the uninsured. In the ethnographic component, safety net institutions experienced increased workload and financial stress; mental health services declined sharply. Immunization rate, as an important sentinel event, deteriorated.

Conclusions

MMC exerted greater effects on safety net providers than on individuals and did not address problems of the uninsured. A multimethod approach can facilitate evaluation of change in health policy.

SUBMITTER: Waitzkin H

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2517275 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Multimethod evaluation of health policy change: an application to Medicaid managed care in a rural state.

Waitzkin Howard H Schillaci Michael M Willging Cathleen E CE

Health services research 20080401 4

<h4>Objective</h4>To answer questions about the impacts of Medicaid managed care (MMC) at the individual, organizational/community, and population levels of analysis.<h4>Data sources/study setting</h4>Multimethod approach to study MMC in New Mexico, a rural state with challenging access barriers.<h4>Study design</h4>Individual level: surveys to assess barriers to care, access, utilization, and satisfaction. Organizational/community level: ethnography to determine changes experienced by safety ne ...[more]

PMID: 18384362

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Project description:ImportanceMedicaid and Children's Health Insurance Program cover almost 50% of children with special health care needs (CSHCN). CSHCN often require specialty services and have been increasingly enrolled in Medicaid managed care (MMC) plans, but there is a dearth of recent national studies on specialty care access among publicly insured children and particularly CSHCN.ObjectiveTo provide recent, nationwide evidence on the association of MMC penetration with specialty care access among publicly insured children, with a special focus on CSHCN.Design, setting, and participantsThis cross-sectional study used nationally representative data from the 2016 to 2019 National Survey of Children's Health to identify publicly insured children in 41 states that administered comprehensive managed care organizations for Medicaid. Data analysis was performed from May 2022 to March 2023.ExposureForm CMS-416 data were used to measure state-year level share of Medicaid-enrolled children who were covered by MMC (ie, MMC penetration).Main outcomes and measuresMeasures of specialty care access included whether, in the past year, the child had (1) any visit to non-mental health (MH) specialists, (2) any visit to MH professionals, and (3) any unmet health care needs and (4) whether the caregiver ever felt frustrated getting services for their child. Logistic regression models were used to examine the association of MMC penetration with specialty care access among all publicly insured children, and separately for CSHCN and non-CSHCN.ResultsAmong 20 029 publicly insured children, 7164 (35.8%) were CSHCN, 9537 (48.2%) were female, 4110 (37.2%) were caregiver-reported Hispanic, and 2812 (21.4%) were caregiver-reported non-Hispanic Black (all percentages are weighted). MMC was not associated with significant changes in any visit to non-MH specialists and unmet health care needs. In addition, MMC penetration was positively associated with caregiver frustration among all children (adjusted odds ratio, 1.23; 95% CI, 1.03-1.48; P = .02) and was negatively associated with any visit to MH professionals among CSHCN (adjusted odds ratio, 0.75; 95% CI, 0.58-0.98; P = .04).Conclusions and relevanceIn this cross-sectional study evaluating MMC and specialty care access for publicly insured children, increased MMC enrollment was not associated with improved specialty care access for publicly insured children, including CSHCN. MMC was associated with less access to specialties like MH and increased frustrations among caregivers seeking services for their children.

Project description:ImportanceMedicaid recipients have consistently reported less timely access to specialists than patients with other types of coverage. By 2018, state Medicaid agencies will be required by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to enact time and distance standards for managed care organizations to ensure an adequate supply of specialist physicians for enrollees; however, there have been no published studies of whether these policies have significant effects on access to specialty care.ObjectiveTo compare ratings of access to specialists for adult Medicaid and commercial enrollees before and after the implementation of specialty access standards.Design, setting, and participantsWe used Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems survey data to conduct a quasiexperimental difference-in-differences (DID) analysis of 20 163 nonelderly adult Medicaid managed care (MMC) enrollees and 54 465 commercially insured enrollees in 5 states adopting access standards, and 37 290 MMC enrollees in 5 matched states that previously adopted access standards.Main outcomes and measuresReported access to specialty care in the previous 6 months.ResultsSeven thousand six hundred ninety-eight (69%) Medicaid enrollees and 28 423 (75%) commercial enrollees reported that it was always or usually easy to get an appointment with a specialist before the policy implementation (or at baseline) compared with 11 889 (67%) of Medicaid enrollees in states that had previously implemented access standards. Overall, there was no significant improvement in timely access to specialty services for MMC enrollees in the period following implementation of standard(s) (adjusted difference-in-differences, -1.2 percentage points; 95% CI, -2.7 to 0.1), nor was there any impact of access standards on insurance-based disparities in access (0.6 percentage points; 95% CI, -4.3 to 5.4). There was heterogeneity across states, with 1 state that implemented both time and distance standards demonstrating significant improvements in access and reductions in disparities.Conclusions and relevanceSpecialty access standards did not lead to widespread improvements in access to specialist physicians. Meaningful improvements in access to specialty care for Medicaid recipients may require additional interventions.

Dataset Information

Multimethod evaluation of health policy change: an application to Medicaid managed care in a rural state.

Objective

Data sources/study setting

Study design

Data collection/extraction methods

Survey

Principal findings

Conclusions

Publications

Multimethod evaluation of health policy change: an application to Medicaid managed care in a rural state.

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