Affordable Care Act

Medicaid Expansion Helps Save Hospitals

Hospitals in states that took advantage of the Affordable Care Act to expand their Medicaid programs are six times less likely to close than hospitals in non-expansion states. And the impact of Medicaid expansion is even more beneficial for hospitals that serve rural communities. These are among the new findings in a new study that examines the effect of Medicaid expansion on hospital finances and hospital closures. Among those findings, We found that the ACA’s Medicaid expansion was associated with improved hospital financial performance and substantially lower likelihoods of closure, especially in rural markets and counties with large numbers of [...]

iqtsupport2018-01-10T06:00:57-05:00January 10, 2018|Affordable Care Act, hospitals, Medicaid|

CMS Takes First Steps Toward Medicaid DSH Cuts

Federal funds allocated to states to make Medicaid disproportionate share hospital payments (Medicaid DSH) payments would be reduced beginning in FY 2018 under a new rule proposed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. The Medicaid DSH cuts, mandated by the Affordable Care Act but delayed several times at the behest of Congress, would come in the form of reduced Medicaid DSH allocations to individual states, with the size of those allocation cuts based on the nature of individual states’ Medicaid programs and changes in the number of uninsured patients in individual states. The cuts were established in the [...]

iqtsupport2017-07-31T06:00:34-04:00July 31, 2017|Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, hospitals, Medicaid|

Budget Reconciliation Explained

Congress may use the federal budget reconciliation process to repeal some aspects of the Affordable Care Act. But what is the budget reconciliation process and how does it work? Kaiser Health News has created a brief video, with an accompanying transcript, that explains. Find that video here.

iqtsupport2017-02-10T09:07:01-05:00February 10, 2017|Affordable Care Act|

Health Centers Rise to Medicaid Challenge

The nation’s federally funded health centers responded to the Affordable Care Act by serving more Medicaid patients than ever and improving the quality of care they provide. According to a new study published in the journal Health Affairs, Medicaid expansion was associated with improved quality on four of eight measures examined: asthma treatment, Pap testing, body mass index assessment, and hypertension control. Learn more about how Medicaid expansion affected federally funded health centers and how those centers responded to that expansion in the study “At Federally Funded Health Centers, Medicaid Expansion Was Associated With Improved Quality Of Care,” which can [...]

iqtsupport2017-01-23T06:00:39-05:00January 23, 2017|Affordable Care Act, Medicaid|