Who Are the Remaining Uninsured, and What Do Their Characteristics Tell Us About How to Reach Them?

By Linda J. Blumberg, Michael Karpman, Matthew Buettgens, and Patricia Solleveld
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
Urban Institute, March 2016

From the Introduction

Although the ACA was not designed to eliminate uninsurance, a detailed assessment of those remaining uninsured after reform can provide insight into the potential to increase coverage further.

Main Findings

*  According to the CPS-ASEC, 32.9 million nonelderly residents of the United States remained uninsured as of March 2015, constituting 12.2 percent of the total non-elderly, civilian, non-institutionalized population of the country.

*  The rate of uninsurance is significantly higher in (Medicaid) nonexpansion states, where 15.4 percent of the nonelderly are uninsured compared with only 10.1 percent in expansion states, a relative difference of over 50 percent.

*  About 28 percent of the uninsured are eligible for Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program (Medicaid/CHIP), and 21 percent are eligible for marketplace tax credits.

*  Fully 66.5 percent of uninsured children are eligible for Medicaid/CHIP compared with only 20.6 percent of uninsured adults.

*  We posit that the uninsured who are eligible for the greatest amount of financial assistance under the ACA — 12.4 million uninsured in total — are those for whom additional outreach and enrollment efforts are likely to be most successful.

*  Absent further policy changes (e.g., more states expanding Medicaid, increased financial assistance, and expanded eligibility for assistance), we do not expect that a substantial share of the other uninsured — who constitute 20.6 million of the total — will gain coverage.

*  Targeting of resources to those 12.4 million uninsured with the greatest potential to enroll in either Medicaid/CHIP or marketplace coverage can be improved by understanding their characteristics.

From the Conclusion

Our analysis of the CPS-ASEC combined with past work on program participation rates and case studies on insurance enrollment behavior under the ACA suggests that two subpopulations of the uninsured have the most promise in further expanding coverage: the Medicaid eligible and the low-income marketplace tax credit eligible. These are the uninsured eligible for the most comprehensive coverage at the lowest direct cost under current law, and those eligible for this level of assistance have relatively high rates of participation in health insurance programs. Together, these subgroups account for 37.5 percent of the remaining uninsured, or approximately 12.4 million people.

Under current law, however, expectations of increasing coverage substantially among the other 62.5 percent of the remaining uninsured should be tempered. Although some additional coverage within these groups is likely as the individual mandate penalties increase and information on available coverage alternatives spread further, gains are likely to be quite modest unless further financial assistance is provided.

http://www.rwjf.org/content/dam/farm/reports/issue_briefs/2016/rwjf427898

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

Perhaps the most important statement in this report on the remaining uninsured is the following: “The ACA was not designed to eliminate uninsurance.” It should be no surprise that we are left with trying to figure out why so many are uninsured and who they are when the architects of the Affordable Care Act abandoned, in advance, any effort to make health care insurance truly universal.

If there is good news in this report it is that there are two groups in which, with concerted effort, we can increase rates of enrollment: the uninsured eligible for Medicaid/CHIP, and the lower-income uninsured eligible for government subsidies for ACA exchange plans. These eligible individuals are more likely to accept coverage because government subsidies make it free or very low cost to them. But those eligible are still a minority of the uninsured – 12.4 million individuals.

The majority of the uninsured – 62.5 percent, 20.6 million individuals – have no publicly-supported programs available for them and are likely to remain uninsured. It has been suggested that we can expand coverage through incremental changes in ACA, but, because of political, logistical and financial barriers, it would be very difficult to design add-on programs that would be effective in bringing these individuals under the coverage umbrella.

Another problem is that a static picture at one point in time does not lead to policies that would address the instability in coverage due to changes in income, employment, age, residency, and other requirements that determine the type of coverage for which an individual may or may not be eligible. As we work on the front end to expand coverage to the currently uninsured, people are falling off of the back end as they lose their coverage and may face new barriers to transitioning to other programs. This instability makes it virtually impossible to ever cover everyone simultaneously under our fragmented system that has been perpetuated by ACA.

So do we want everyone insured? I would say absolutely yes, but it is not going to happen under a system that was clearly not designed to do that. In contrast, an Improved Medicare for All would be designed to actually cover everyone, permanently, not to mention the multitude of other social and health benefits that it would bring to all of us.

Who Are the Remaining Uninsured, and What Do Their Characteristics Tell Us About How to Reach Them?

By Linda J. Blumberg, Michael Karpman, Matthew Buettgens, and Patricia Solleveld
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
Urban Institute, March 2016

From the Introduction

Although the ACA was not designed to eliminate uninsurance, a detailed assessment of those remaining uninsured after reform can provide insight into the potential to increase coverage further.

Main Findings

*  According to the CPS-ASEC, 32.9 million nonelderly residents of the United States remained uninsured as of March 2015, constituting 12.2 percent of the total non-elderly, civilian, non-institutionalized population of the country.

*  The rate of uninsurance is significantly higher in (Medicaid) nonexpansion states, where 15.4 percent of the nonelderly are uninsured compared with only 10.1 percent in expansion states, a relative difference of over 50 percent.

*  About 28 percent of the uninsured are eligible for Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program (Medicaid/CHIP), and 21 percent are eligible for marketplace tax credits.

*  Fully 66.5 percent of uninsured children are eligible for Medicaid/CHIP compared with only 20.6 percent of uninsured adults.

*  We posit that the uninsured who are eligible for the greatest amount of financial assistance under the ACA — 12.4 million uninsured in total — are those for whom additional outreach and enrollment efforts are likely to be most successful.

*  Absent further policy changes (e.g., more states expanding Medicaid, increased financial assistance, and expanded eligibility for assistance), we do not expect that a substantial share of the other uninsured — who constitute 20.6 million of the total — will gain coverage.

*  Targeting of resources to those 12.4 million uninsured with the greatest potential to enroll in either Medicaid/CHIP or marketplace coverage can be improved by understanding their characteristics.

From the Conclusion

Our analysis of the CPS-ASEC combined with past work on program participation rates and case studies on insurance enrollment behavior under the ACA suggests that two subpopulations of the uninsured have the most promise in further expanding coverage: the Medicaid eligible and the low-income marketplace tax credit eligible. These are the uninsured eligible for the most comprehensive coverage at the lowest direct cost under current law, and those eligible for this level of assistance have relatively high rates of participation in health insurance programs. Together, these subgroups account for 37.5 percent of the remaining uninsured, or approximately 12.4 million people.

Under current law, however, expectations of increasing coverage substantially among the other 62.5 percent of the remaining uninsured should be tempered. Although some additional coverage within these groups is likely as the individual mandate penalties increase and information on available coverage alternatives spread further, gains are likely to be quite modest unless further financial assistance is provided.

http://www.rwjf.org/content/dam/farm/reports/issue_briefs/2016/rwjf427898

Perhaps the most important statement in this report on the remaining uninsured is the following: “The ACA was not designed to eliminate uninsurance.” It should be no surprise that we are left with trying to figure out why so many are uninsured and who they are when the architects of the Affordable Care Act abandoned, in advance, any effort to make health care insurance truly universal.

If there is good news in this report it is that there are two groups in which, with concerted effort, we can increase rates of enrollment: the uninsured eligible for Medicaid/CHIP, and the lower-income uninsured eligible for government subsidies for ACA exchange plans. These eligible individuals are more likely to accept coverage because government subsidies make it free or very low cost to them. But those eligible are still a minority of the uninsured – 12.4 million individuals.

The majority of the uninsured – 62.5 percent, 20.6 million individuals – have no publicly-supported programs available for them and are likely to remain uninsured. It has been suggested that we can expand coverage through incremental changes in ACA, but, because of political, logistical and financial barriers, it would be very difficult to design add-on programs that would be effective in bringing these individuals under the coverage umbrella.

Another problem is that a static picture at one point in time does not lead to policies that would address the instability in coverage due to changes in income, employment, age, residency, and other requirements that determine the type of coverage for which an individual may or may not be eligible. As we work on the front end to expand coverage to the currently uninsured, people are falling off of the back end as they lose their coverage and may face new barriers to transitioning to other programs. This instability makes it virtually impossible to ever cover everyone simultaneously under our fragmented system that has been perpetuated by ACA.

So do we want everyone insured? I would say absolutely yes, but it is not going to happen under a system that was clearly not designed to do that. In contrast, an Improved Medicare for All would be designed to actually cover everyone, permanently, not to mention the multitude of other social and health benefits that it would bring to all of us.

Newly Enrolled Members in the Individual Health Insurance Market After Health Care Reform: The Experience from 2014 and 2015

BlueCross BlueShield, March 2016

This report is a comprehensive, in-depth study of medical claims among those enrolled in BCBS individual coverage before and after the ACA took effect.

Comparing the health status and use of medical services among those who enrolled in individual coverage before and after the ACA took effect, as well as those with employer-based health insurance, the study finds that:

•  Members who newly enrolled in BCBS individual health plans in 2014 and 2015 have higher rates of certain diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, depression, coronary artery disease, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and Hepatitis C than individuals who already had BCBS individual coverage.

•  Consumers who newly enrolled in BCBS individual health plans in 2014 and 2015 received significantly more medical services in their first year of coverage, on average, than those with BCBS individual plans prior to 2014 who maintained BCBS individual health coverage into 2015, as well as those with BCBS employer-based group health coverage.

•  The new enrollees used more medical services across all sites of care—including inpatient hospital admissions, outpatient visits, medical professional services, prescriptions filled and emergency room visits.

•  Medical costs associated with caring for the new individual market enrollees were, on average, 19 percent higher than employer-based group members in 2014 and 22 percent higher in 2015. For example, the average monthly medical spending was $559 for individual enrollees versus $457 for employer-based group members in 2015.

http://www.bcbs.com/healthofamerica/newly_enrolled_individuals_after_aca.pdf

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

Compared with members previously enrolled in BlueCross BlueShield plans, those enrolling after the Affordable Care Act (ACA) took effect have higher rates of certain diseases, use more medical services across all sites of care, and have higher medical costs associated with care – 22 percent higher in 2015. Adverse selection – concentrating more costly patients in the ACA-compliant plans – was a consequence of the design selected for expanding health care coverage in the United States.

Although required benefits were increased by ACA, to keep premiums affordable patients were leveraged into lower actuarial value plans, especially plans like the silver plans that pay 70 percent of allowable charges. Outside of the exchanges, the other 30 percent is paid by patients, especially through much higher deductibles. Also some income is forgone by providers who contract for lower fees to serve in narrow networks that take away patients’ choices in health care.

It was obvious that many people with modest incomes would not be able to afford their share of the costs of these plans so the politicians included income-based federal subsidies for both the premiums and the cost sharing of the silver plans purchased through the ACA insurance exchanges (marketplaces).

Fine, but what about the hard working middle-income individuals and families who have just enough income that they are disqualified from receiving the subsidies? They are hurting. The higher premiums, the higher deductibles, and the decrease in choices through narrower networks are a greater burden that has been placed on these individuals and families.

This new BCBS report is further bad news for middle-income Americans. It shows that the ACA-compliant plans, both within and outside of the exchanges, have been subjected to adverse selection – the individuals pooled in these plans have greater medical needs and thus are more expensive – driving up premiums and increasing deductibles, with the full brunt borne by middle-income families that do not qualify for subsidies.

It does not have to be this way. We could improve Medicare, expand it to include everyone, and pay for it with equitable taxes based on ability to pay, wherein nobody suffers a financial hardship because of health care. Adverse selection would no longer exist because everyone would be included in the same universal risk pool.

Newly Enrolled Members in the Individual Health Insurance Market After Health Care Reform: The Experience from 2014 and 2015

BlueCross BlueShield, March 2016

This report is a comprehensive, in-depth study of medical claims among those enrolled in BCBS individual coverage before and after the ACA took effect.

Comparing the health status and use of medical services among those who enrolled in individual coverage before and after the ACA took effect, as well as those with employer-based health insurance, the study finds that:

•  Members who newly enrolled in BCBS individual health plans in 2014 and 2015 have higher rates of certain diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, depression, coronary artery disease, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and Hepatitis C than individuals who already had BCBS individual coverage.

•  Consumers who newly enrolled in BCBS individual health plans in 2014 and 2015 received significantly more medical services in their first year of coverage, on average, than those with BCBS individual plans prior to 2014 who maintained BCBS individual health coverage into 2015, as well as those with BCBS employer-based group health coverage.

•  The new enrollees used more medical services across all sites of care—including inpatient hospital admissions, outpatient visits, medical professional services, prescriptions filled and emergency room visits.

•  Medical costs associated with caring for the new individual market enrollees were, on average, 19 percent higher than employer-based group members in 2014 and 22 percent higher in 2015. For example, the average monthly medical spending was $559 for individual enrollees versus $457 for employer-based group members in 2015.

http://www.bcbs.com/healthofamerica/newly_enrolled_individuals_after_aca.pdf

Compared with members previously enrolled in BlueCross BlueShield plans, those enrolling after the Affordable Care Act (ACA) took effect have higher rates of certain diseases, use more medical services across all sites of care, and have higher medical costs associated with care – 22 percent higher in 2015. Adverse selection – concentrating more costly patients in the ACA-compliant plans – was a consequence of the design selected for expanding health care coverage in the United States.

Although required benefits were increased by ACA, to keep premiums affordable patients were leveraged into lower actuarial value plans, especially plans like the silver plans that pay 70 percent of allowable charges. Outside of the exchanges, the other 30 percent is paid by patients, especially through much higher deductibles. Also some income is forgone by providers who contract for lower fees to serve in narrow networks that take away patients’ choices in health care.

It was obvious that many people with modest incomes would not be able to afford their share of the costs of these plans so the politicians included income-based federal subsidies for both the premiums and the cost sharing of the silver plans purchased through the ACA insurance exchanges (marketplaces).

Fine, but what about the hard working middle-income individuals and families who have just enough income that they are disqualified from receiving the subsidies? They are hurting. The higher premiums, the higher deductibles, and the decrease in choices through narrower networks are a greater burden that has been placed on these individuals and families.

This new BCBS report is further bad news for middle-income Americans. It shows that the ACA-compliant plans, both within and outside of the exchanges, have been subjected to adverse selection – the individuals pooled in these plans have greater medical needs and thus are more expensive – driving up premiums and increasing deductibles, with the full brunt borne by middle-income families that do not qualify for subsidies.

It does not have to be this way. We could improve Medicare, expand it to include everyone, and pay for it with equitable taxes based on ability to pay, wherein nobody suffers a financial hardship because of health care. Adverse selection would no longer exist because everyone would be included in the same universal risk pool.

Mortgages For Expensive Health Care? Some Experts Think It Can Work.

By Michelle Andrews
Kaiser Health News, March 29, 2016

A Massachusetts Institute of Technology economist and Harvard oncologist have a proposal to get highly effective but prohibitively expensive drugs into consumers’ hands: health care installment loans.

Writing last month in the journal Science Translational Medicine, the authors liken drug loans to mortgages, noting that both can enable consumers to buy big-ticket items requiring a hefty up-front payment that they could not otherwise afford.

Some consumer advocates and health insurance experts see it differently.

“Isn’t this why we have health insurance?” asked Mark Rukavina, a Boston-based health care consultant whose work has focused on affordability and medical debt. “Insurance used to protect people from financial ruin for these unpredictable, costly occurrences. Now, with large deductibles, we’ve got coverage for preventive care but not for treatment.”

Andrew Lo, a financial economist at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, and Dr. David Weinstock, an oncologist at the Harvard-affiliated Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, agree that insurance would be a better option. But for many consumers that isn’t enough protection these days.

“This is a private sector stopgap way to deal with something right now,” said Lo.

Their proposal calls for the loans to be financed by a pool of investors who would buy bonds and equities issued by an organization that makes the loans to consumers.

While it’s “distasteful” to talk about patients mortgaging their lives for treatment, Lo said, they hope the proposal will spur change.

http://khn.org/news/mortgages-for-expensive-health-care-some-experts-think-it-can-work/

***

Buying cures versus renting health: Financing health care with consumer loans

By Vahid Montazerhodjat, David M. Weinstock, and Andrew W. Lo
Science Translational Medicine, February 24, 2016

Abstract

A crisis is building over the prices of new transformative therapies for cancer, hepatitis C virus infection, and rare diseases. The clinical imperative is to offer these therapies as broadly and rapidly as possible. We propose a practical way to increase drug affordability through health care loans (HCLs) — the equivalent of mortgages for large health care expenses. HCLs allow patients in both multipayer and single-payer markets to access a broader set of therapeutics, including expensive short-duration treatments that are curative. HCLs also link payment to clinical benefit and should help lower per-patient cost while incentivizing the development of transformative therapies rather than those that offer small incremental advances. Moreover, we propose the use of securitization — a well-known financial engineering method — to finance a large diversified pool of HCLs through both debt and equity. Numerical simulations suggest that securitization is viable for a wide range of economic environments and cost parameters, allowing a much broader patient population to access transformative therapies while also aligning the interests of patients, payers, and the pharmaceutical industry.

The Role of Health Insurance

Large copays are antithetical to the very purpose of health insurance. Hence, our proposal for patients to cover these costs with HCLs is only a short-run bridging solution. A more sustainable and economically more efficient approach to address the high cost of transformative therapies is for insurance companies to cover these costs, spread the amortized costs across their policyholders, finance the upfront payments using securitization, and set premiums at the appropriate levels to cover these costs. In return for larger drug purchases, insurance companies would wield substantial leverage to negotiate lower prices. Also, insurers would presumably borrow at lower interest rates than would individual patients, further reducing the overall financing cost of these therapies.

Conclusion

The burden of upfront payment for curative therapies makes it challenging for public and private payers to afford universal access to potentially life-saving therapies. To address this issue, we considered a new financing paradigm in which portfolio theory and securitization techniques are used to finance HCLs whose repayment is linked to ongoing value. By estimating the post-treatment mortality rates of the patients and using statistical models to gauge the default characteristics of these loans, we demonstrate viability under current practical conditions. Securitization brings new participants (for example, pension funds, mutual funds, and life insurance companies) into the financing pool and helps transform a set of disjointed and sometimes competing interests into a more cooperative system focused on improving care. HCLs, not unlike student loans, auto loans, and home mortgages, can improve access to the best health care for the less affluent.

Considering the extremely large burden of certain diseases, such as HCV, for which cures already exist, and the many transformative therapies on the horizon, developing more efficient financing methods is now a matter of life and death. Taking action is no longer a choice but has become a necessity.

http://stm.sciencemag.org/content/8/327/327ps6.full

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

So the answer to outrageously priced drugs is to pay for them through health care loans (HCLs) – the equivalent of mortgages – and then use securitization “to finance a large diversified pool of HCLs through both debt and equity.” Did we not learn anything from the subprime mortgage crisis? Just as securitization of subprime loans became a “necessity,” securitization of HCLs is now not only supposedly necessary to prevent personal insolvency, it is, according to Andrew Lo, et al, “a matter of life and death.”

In Lo’s words, “While it’s ‘distasteful’ to talk about patients mortgaging their lives for treatment, they hope the proposal will spur change.”

Oh my.

An improved Medicare for all with first dollar coverage would eliminate any need to consider such an inhumane concept.

Mortgages For Expensive Health Care? Some Experts Think It Can Work.

By Michelle Andrews
Kaiser Health News, March 29, 2016

A Massachusetts Institute of Technology economist and Harvard oncologist have a proposal to get highly effective but prohibitively expensive drugs into consumers’ hands: health care installment loans.

Writing last month in the journal Science Translational Medicine, the authors liken drug loans to mortgages, noting that both can enable consumers to buy big-ticket items requiring a hefty up-front payment that they could not otherwise afford.

Some consumer advocates and health insurance experts see it differently.

“Isn’t this why we have health insurance?” asked Mark Rukavina, a Boston-based health care consultant whose work has focused on affordability and medical debt. “Insurance used to protect people from financial ruin for these unpredictable, costly occurrences. Now, with large deductibles, we’ve got coverage for preventive care but not for treatment.”

Andrew Lo, a financial economist at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, and Dr. David Weinstock, an oncologist at the Harvard-affiliated Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, agree that insurance would be a better option. But for many consumers that isn’t enough protection these days.

“This is a private sector stopgap way to deal with something right now,” said Lo.

Their proposal calls for the loans to be financed by a pool of investors who would buy bonds and equities issued by an organization that makes the loans to consumers.

While it’s “distasteful” to talk about patients mortgaging their lives for treatment, Lo said, they hope the proposal will spur change.

http://khn.org/news/mortgages-for-expensive-health-care-some-experts-think-it-can-work/

***

Buying cures versus renting health: Financing health care with consumer loans

By Vahid Montazerhodjat, David M. Weinstock, and Andrew W. Lo
Science Translational Medicine, February 24, 2016

Abstract

A crisis is building over the prices of new transformative therapies for cancer, hepatitis C virus infection, and rare diseases. The clinical imperative is to offer these therapies as broadly and rapidly as possible. We propose a practical way to increase drug affordability through health care loans (HCLs) — the equivalent of mortgages for large health care expenses. HCLs allow patients in both multipayer and single-payer markets to access a broader set of therapeutics, including expensive short-duration treatments that are curative. HCLs also link payment to clinical benefit and should help lower per-patient cost while incentivizing the development of transformative therapies rather than those that offer small incremental advances. Moreover, we propose the use of securitization — a well-known financial engineering method — to finance a large diversified pool of HCLs through both debt and equity. Numerical simulations suggest that securitization is viable for a wide range of economic environments and cost parameters, allowing a much broader patient population to access transformative therapies while also aligning the interests of patients, payers, and the pharmaceutical industry.

The Role of Health Insurance

Large copays are antithetical to the very purpose of health insurance. Hence, our proposal for patients to cover these costs with HCLs is only a short-run bridging solution. A more sustainable and economically more efficient approach to address the high cost of transformative therapies is for insurance companies to cover these costs, spread the amortized costs across their policyholders, finance the upfront payments using securitization, and set premiums at the appropriate levels to cover these costs. In return for larger drug purchases, insurance companies would wield substantial leverage to negotiate lower prices. Also, insurers would presumably borrow at lower interest rates than would individual patients, further reducing the overall financing cost of these therapies.

Conclusion

The burden of upfront payment for curative therapies makes it challenging for public and private payers to afford universal access to potentially life-saving therapies. To address this issue, we considered a new financing paradigm in which portfolio theory and securitization techniques are used to finance HCLs whose repayment is linked to ongoing value. By estimating the post-treatment mortality rates of the patients and using statistical models to gauge the default characteristics of these loans, we demonstrate viability under current practical conditions. Securitization brings new participants (for example, pension funds, mutual funds, and life insurance companies) into the financing pool and helps transform a set of disjointed and sometimes competing interests into a more cooperative system focused on improving care. HCLs, not unlike student loans, auto loans, and home mortgages, can improve access to the best health care for the less affluent.

Considering the extremely large burden of certain diseases, such as HCV, for which cures already exist, and the many transformative therapies on the horizon, developing more efficient financing methods is now a matter of life and death. Taking action is no longer a choice but has become a necessity.

http://stm.sciencemag.org/content/8/327/327ps6.full

So the answer to outrageously priced drugs is to pay for them through health care loans (HCLs) – the equivalent of mortgages – and then use securitization “to finance a large diversified pool of HCLs through both debt and equity.” Did we not learn anything from the subprime mortgage crisis? Just as securitization of subprime loans became a “necessity,” securitization of HCLs is now not only supposedly necessary to prevent personal insolvency, it is, according to Andrew Lo, et al, “a matter of life and death.”

In Lo’s words, “While it’s ‘distasteful’ to talk about patients mortgaging their lives for treatment, they hope the proposal will spur change.”

Oh my.

An improved Medicare for all with first dollar coverage would eliminate any need to consider such an inhumane concept.

Majority of Drugs Now Subject to Coinsurance in Medicare Part D Plans

By Caroline F. Pearson
Avalere, March 10, 2016

A new analysis from Avalere finds that a majority of prescription drugs covered by standalone Medicare Part D plans (PDPs) are subject to coinsurance, rather than copayments, in 2016. Coinsurance is when a beneficiary pays a percentage of the cost of the drug, rather than a fixed dollar amount, or copayment. Coinsurance often leads to patients paying more out of pocket compared to fixed dollar amount copayments. The average percentage of covered drugs facing coinsurance has risen sharply from 35 percent in 2014 to 58 percent in 2016 among PDPs. While most PDPs have historically applied coinsurance to high-cost drugs on the specialty tier, plans have extended coinsurance to drugs on lower tiers in recent years, including those covered on preferred and non-preferred brand tiers.

“These very high rates of coinsurance have shifted our understanding of Part D formulary coverage,” said Caroline Pearson, senior vice president at Avalere. “It will be important to monitor what drugs are being placed on various coinsurance tiers and how plans are using these tiers to manage cost and utilization in the program.”

http://avalere.com/expertise/managed-care/insights/majority-of-drugs-now-subject-to-coinsurance-in-medicare-part-d-plans

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

Medicare Part D drug plans are shifting more drugs from a copayment requirement – a fixed dollar amount to be paid for each prescription – to coinsurance – a percentage of the charge for each prescription. This is important because coinsurance payments tend to be higher than copayments – sometimes much higher – especially with the recent increases in drug prices.

Obviously this is simply one more method of shifting the costs of health care to the patient. Many are already finding out-of-pocket costs to be unaffordable, yet it keeps getting worse. This is a one way street. The insurers are not looking for ways to reduce out-of-pocket expenses since they would have to pick up the additional costs which would then make their premiums less affordable, and the last thing that they would want to do is risk losing market share through higher premiums.

Coinsurance is a method of reducing health spending by erecting financial barriers to the care that patients should have. Instead, we should be removing financial barriers to care. That is what an improved Medicare for all with first dollar coverage would do.

Majority of Drugs Now Subject to Coinsurance in Medicare Part D Plans

By Caroline F. Pearson
Avalere, March 10, 2016

A new analysis from Avalere finds that a majority of prescription drugs covered by standalone Medicare Part D plans (PDPs) are subject to coinsurance, rather than copayments, in 2016. Coinsurance is when a beneficiary pays a percentage of the cost of the drug, rather than a fixed dollar amount, or copayment. Coinsurance often leads to patients paying more out of pocket compared to fixed dollar amount copayments. The average percentage of covered drugs facing coinsurance has risen sharply from 35 percent in 2014 to 58 percent in 2016 among PDPs. While most PDPs have historically applied coinsurance to high-cost drugs on the specialty tier, plans have extended coinsurance to drugs on lower tiers in recent years, including those covered on preferred and non-preferred brand tiers.

“These very high rates of coinsurance have shifted our understanding of Part D formulary coverage,” said Caroline Pearson, senior vice president at Avalere. “It will be important to monitor what drugs are being placed on various coinsurance tiers and how plans are using these tiers to manage cost and utilization in the program.”

http://avalere.com/expertise/managed-care/insights/majority-of-drugs-now-subject-to-coinsurance-in-medicare-part-d-plans

Medicare Part D drug plans are shifting more drugs from a copayment requirement – a fixed dollar amount to be paid for each prescription – to coinsurance – a percentage of the charge for each prescription. This is important because coinsurance payments tend to be higher than copayments – sometimes much higher – especially with the recent increases in drug prices.

Obviously this is simply one more method of shifting the costs of health care to the patient. Many are already finding out-of-pocket costs to be unaffordable, yet it keeps getting worse. This is a one way street. The insurers are not looking for ways to reduce out-of-pocket expenses since they would have to pick up the additional costs which would then make their premiums less affordable, and the last thing that they would want to do is risk losing market share through higher premiums.

Coinsurance is a method of reducing health spending by erecting financial barriers to the care that patients should have. Instead, we should be removing financial barriers to care. That is what an improved Medicare for all with first dollar coverage would do.

Mayo rebuffs Iowa Medicaid managed-care contracts

By Tony Leys
The Des Moines Register, March 24, 2016

Iowans with Medicaid health coverage will not be able to routinely use the Mayo Clinic after the state shifts the $4 billion program to private management next week.

The three managed-care companies that will run Iowa’s Medicaid program told legislators this week they’ve been unable to negotiate contracts with Mayo’s famed hospital system, which is just across the border in Rochester, Minn.

Cheryl Harding, Amerihealth’s top executive in Iowa, told legislators that her managed-care firm has signed contracts with three Mayo-affiliated primary care clinics in Iowa, but not with Mayo’s main medical center in Rochester. The other managed-care companies, UnitedHealth and Amerigroup, also said they have not obtained such contracts.

For the time being, they said, Mayo has agreed to consider single-case contracts for Iowa Medicaid recipients needing specific care that can’t be provided elsewhere.

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/health/2016/03/24/mayo-rebuffs-iowa-medicaid-managed-care-contracts/82230958/

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

There are so many issues here, but it really boils down to one, which we’ll get to in a moment.

One of primary the goals of health care reform is to provide integrated health care services. The participants in an ideal health care delivery system work together as a team to ensure that the patient receives the right care, at the right time, at the right place. The care pyramid is built on a solid primary care infrastructure that serves, not as a gatekeeper, but as a facilitator.

Examples range from structurally integrated systems such as Kaiser Permanente, to loosely integrated services provided by the various health care resources in a community – hospitals, outpatient centers, community health centers, and independent primary care and specialty practices. In today’s message, Mayo Clinic represents an integrated system with its mothership in Rochester and its affiliated primary care clinics serving patients in its neighboring state of Iowa.

Thus Mayo provides integrated services that would be paid for by private insurers or employer-sponsored plans, either through fee-for-service or capitated payment schedules. Low income patients would be covered by Iowa’s Medicaid program.

But wait a minute. The insurers now profess to provide higher quality and lower costs through their own integrated managed care services. Iowa is following the lead of other states and turning its Medicaid program over to private Medicaid managed care companies. Although they avow quality, early experience with other state Medicaid managed care programs indicate that it is all about saving money, as quality and access deteriorate.

So what is happening to Iowa’s Medicaid patients who are currently obtaining their care from Mayo? It seems that Mayo is no longer in charge of integrating the health care of these patients; the private insurers are instead. For most of the patients, that means they lose access to their current care. One of the insurers will still allow patients to use the Mayo affiliated primary care clinics but not the Mayo mothership in Rochester, except by special arrangement on an individual basis. Instead of integrated care, these managed care companies are providing disintegrated care (double entendre intended).

The obvious conclusion is that integration of health care services should be a function of the health care delivery system based on patient service and not a function of an intermediary payer based on business goals.

A publicly administered and financed single payer monopsony would be designed to incentivize appropriate integration of our health care delivery system so that we really could have a higher quality health care system that brings greater value to all of us.

Mayo rebuffs Iowa Medicaid managed-care contracts

By Tony Leys
The Des Moines Register, March 24, 2016

Iowans with Medicaid health coverage will not be able to routinely use the Mayo Clinic after the state shifts the $4 billion program to private management next week.

The three managed-care companies that will run Iowa’s Medicaid program told legislators this week they’ve been unable to negotiate contracts with Mayo’s famed hospital system, which is just across the border in Rochester, Minn.

Cheryl Harding, Amerihealth’s top executive in Iowa, told legislators that her managed-care firm has signed contracts with three Mayo-affiliated primary care clinics in Iowa, but not with Mayo’s main medical center in Rochester. The other managed-care companies, UnitedHealth and Amerigroup, also said they have not obtained such contracts.

For the time being, they said, Mayo has agreed to consider single-case contracts for Iowa Medicaid recipients needing specific care that can’t be provided elsewhere.

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/health/2016/03/24/mayo-rebuffs-iowa-medicaid-managed-care-contracts/82230958/

There are so many issues here, but it really boils down to one, which we’ll get to in a moment.

One of primary the goals of health care reform is to provide integrated health care services. The participants in an ideal health care delivery system work together as a team to ensure that the patient receives the right care, at the right time, at the right place. The care pyramid is built on a solid primary care infrastructure that serves, not as a gatekeeper, but as a facilitator.

Examples range from structurally integrated systems such as Kaiser Permanente, to loosely integrated services provided by the various health care resources in a community – hospitals, outpatient centers, community health centers, and independent primary care and specialty practices. In today’s message, Mayo Clinic represents an integrated system with its mothership in Rochester and its affiliated primary care clinics serving patients in its neighboring state of Iowa.

Thus Mayo provides integrated services that would be paid for by private insurers or employer-sponsored plans, either through fee-for-service or capitated payment schedules. Low income patients would be covered by Iowa’s Medicaid program.

But wait a minute. The insurers now profess to provide higher quality and lower costs through their own integrated managed care services. Iowa is following the lead of other states and turning its Medicaid program over to private Medicaid managed care companies. Although they avow quality, early experience with other state Medicaid managed care programs indicate that it is all about saving money, as quality and access deteriorate.

So what is happening to Iowa’s Medicaid patients who are currently obtaining their care from Mayo? It seems that Mayo is no longer in charge of integrating the health care of these patients; the private insurers are instead. For most of the patients, that means they lose access to their current care. One of the insurers will still allow patients to use the Mayo affiliated primary care clinics but not the Mayo mothership in Rochester, except by special arrangement on an individual basis. Instead of integrated care, these managed care companies are providing disintegrated care (double entendre intended).

The obvious conclusion is that integration of health care services should be a function of the health care delivery system based on patient service and not a function of an intermediary payer based on business goals.

A publicly administered and financed single payer monopsony would be designed to incentivize appropriate integration of our health care delivery system so that we really could have a higher quality health care system that brings greater value to all of us.