With the end of the COVID-19 pandemic’s continuous Medicaid eligibility coming on April 1, the states now face the challenge of reviewing the eligibility of 90 million people currently on the nation’s Medicaid rolls.  The process, commonly referred to as “Medicaid unwinding,” promises to be challenging to states and current Medicaid participants.

While the federal government has provided considerable guidance on how Medicaid unwinding should proceed, the National Association of Medicaid Directors has ideas of its own that it has presented on the organization’s blog.  Specifically, the group suggests to its members a three-part approach to tackling Medicaid unwinding.

• Phase 1: forming and storming – a period characterized by final preparations to begin the work of redeterminations.
• Phase 2: implementation and course correction – a period characterized by rapid learning, ensuring warm handoffs to other coverage, and responding to unanticipated challenges.
• Phase 3: understanding the new normal – a period characterized by assessment and response to how unwinding has changed Medicaid and the health care delivery system.

Learn more about these phases, how the group envisions them working, and what they may mean for Medicaid participants and providers from the National Association of Medicaid Directors blog article “The Phases of Unwinding: A Framework for the End of Continuous Coverage.”