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Medicaid Work Requirements In Arkansas: Two-Year Impacts On Coverage, Employment, And Affordability Of Care.

ABSTRACT: In June 2018 Arkansas became the first US state to implement work requirements in Medicaid, requiring adults ages 30-49 to work twenty hours a week, participate in "community engagement" activities, or qualify for an exemption to maintain coverage. By April 2019, when a federal judge put the policy on hold, 18,000 adults had already lost coverage. We analyze the policy's effects before and after these events, using a telephone survey performed in late 2019 of 2,706 low-income adults in Arkansas and three control states compared with data from 2016 and 2018. We have four main findings. First, most of the Medicaid coverage losses in 2018 were reversed in 2019 after the court order. Second, work requirements did not increase employment over eighteen months of follow-up. Third, people in Arkansas ages 30-49 who had lost Medicaid in the prior year experienced adverse consequences: 50 percent reported serious problems paying off medical debt, 56 percent delayed care because of cost, and 64 percent delayed taking medications because of cost. These rates were significantly higher than among Arkansans who remained in Medicaid all year. Finally, awareness of the work requirements remained poor, with more than 70 percent of Arkansans unsure whether the policy was in effect.

SUBMITTER: Sommers BD

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7497731 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:ObjectiveTo evaluate episode-based payments for upper respiratory tract infections (URI) and perinatal care in Arkansas's Medicaid population.Study settingUpper respiratory infection and perinatal episodes among Medicaid-covered individuals in Arkansas and comparison states from fiscal year (FY) 2011 to 2014.Study designCross-sectional observational analysis using a difference-in-difference design to examine outcomes associated with URI and perinatal episodes of care (EOC) from 2011 to 2014. Key dependent variables include antibiotic use, emergency department visits, physician visits, hospitalizations, readmission, and preventive screenings.Data collectionClaims data from the Medicaid Analytic Extract for Arkansas, Mississippi, and Missouri from 2010 to 2014 with supplemental county-level data from the Area Health Resource File (AHRF).Principal findingsThe URI EOC reduced the probability of antibiotic use (marginal effect [ME] = -1.8, 90% CI: -2.2, -1.4), physician visits (ME = 0.6, 90% CI: -0.8, -0.4), improved the probability of strep tests for children diagnosed with pharyngitis (ME = 9.4, 90% CI: 8.5, 10.3), but also increased the probability of an emergency department (ED) visit (ME = 0.1, 90% CI: 0.1, 0.2), relative to the comparison group. For perinatal EOCs, we found a reduced probability of an ED visit during pregnancy (ME = 0.1, 90% CI: -0.2, -0.0), an increased probability of screening for HIV (ME = 6.2, 90% CI: 4.0, 8.5), chlamydia (ME = 9.5, 90% CI: 7.2, 11.8), and group B strep-test (ME = 2.6, 90% CI: 0.5, 4.6), relative to the comparison group. Predelivery and postpartum hospitalizations also increased (ME = 1.2, 90% CI: 0.4, 2.0; ME = 0.4, 90% CI: 0.0, 0.8, respectively), relative to the comparison group.ConclusionUpper respiratory infection and perinatal EOCs for Arkansas Medicaid beneficiaries produced mixed results. Aligning shared savings with quality metrics and cost-thresholds may help achieve quality targets and disincentivize over utilization within the EOC, but may also have unintended consequences.

Project description:BACKGROUND:With some Medicaid state programs still restricting patient access to hepatitis C (HCV) treatment, it is important to demonstrate how states could expand treatment access to a broader Medicaid population and balance short-term budget concerns. METHODS:We used the HCV Transmission and Progression (TaP) Markov model to quantify the impact of removing restrictions to HCV treatment access on the infected populations, expenditures, and net social value for the North Carolina (NC), Oregon (OR), and Wisconsin (WI) Medicaid programs. Four HCV treatment access scenarios were modeled: 1) Baseline: Patients were treated according to Medicaid disease severity and sobriety requirements in 2015; 2) Remove Sobriety Restrictions: Disease severity restrictions were maintained, but people who inject drugs (PWID) were given access to treatment; 3) Treat Early: All patients, except for PWIDs, regardless of disease severity, were eligible for treatment and the diagnosis rate increased from 50 to 66%; and 4) Remove Access Restrictions: all patients, regardless of disease severity and sobriety, were eligible for treatment. Our key model outputs were: number of infected Medicaid beneficiaries, HCV-related medical and treatment expenditures, total social value, and state Medicaid spending over 10?years. RESULTS:Across all three states, removing access restrictions resulted in the greatest benefits over 10?years (net social value relative to baseline?=?$408?M in NC; $408?M in OR; $271?M in WI) and the smallest infected population (5200 in NC; 2000 in OR; 614 in WI). Reduced disease transmission resulted in lower health care expenditures (-$66?M in NC; -$50?M in OR; -$54?M in WI). All of the expanded treatment access policies achieved break-even costs-where total treatment and health care expenditures fell below those of Baseline-in 4 to 8?years. Removing access restrictions yielded the greatest improvement in social value (net of medical expenditures and treatment costs, QALYs valued at $150?K per QALY). CONCLUSIONS:While increasing treatment access in Medicaid will raise short-term costs, it will also provide clear benefits relatively quickly by saving money and improving health within a 10-year window. Patients and taxpayers would benefit by considering these gains and taking a more expansive and long-term view of HCV treatment policies.

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Medicaid Work Requirements In Arkansas: Two-Year Impacts On Coverage, Employment, And Affordability Of Care.

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