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KFF designs, conducts and analyzes original public opinion and survey research on Americans’ attitudes, knowledge, and experiences with the health care system to help amplify the public’s voice in major national debates.
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This issue brief highlights key differences between Medicare and Medicaid and raises questions about how a policy to lower the age of Medicare eligibility could affect individuals who are currently enrolled in Medicaid.
Medicare provides significant health and financial protections to more than 60 million Americans, but there are gaps in coverage and high cost-sharing requirements that can make health care difficult to afford. This report analyzes several policy options that could help make health care more affordable for people covered by Medicare, especially beneficiaries with relatively low incomes: adding an out-of-pocket limit to traditional Medicare, adding a hard out-of-pocket cap to Part D, expanding financial assistance through…
Even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, hormonal contraception became more accessible to many outside of traditional clinical settings through websites or apps that offer contraception via telehealth. To better understand this emerging method of contraceptive access, a new KFF analysis provides a deeper look at telecontraception platforms, offering insights into the practices of 13 different companies based on information collected between November 2020 through January 2021. Key highlights from the report include: All of the…
This report provides a close examination of reproductive age (18-49) females' (including those who identify as women and other genders) experiences with contraception, insurance coverage, contraceptive preferences, and interactions with the health care system based on an analysis of the 2022 KFF Women's Health Survey, a nationally representative survey of females ages 18-64 in the United States.
This post provides an overview of how health care coverage and access will and won’t change when the public health emergency ends on May 11, including a discussion of COVID-19 vaccines, tests, and treatments, and telemedicine.
A new KFF issue brief compares the main drivers of health spending in the United States and other large, wealthy countries, and finds that the cost of inpatient and outpatient care – much more so than prescription drugs or administrative costs – drives high per capita health spending in the U.S. In 2018, the U.S. spent $10,637 on health per person – nearly twice as much as other comparably large and wealthy countries. The analysis finds…
Since taking office in 2017, President Trump has laid down an extensive record on health care, including his response to the COVID-19 pandemic, his early and ongoing efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, his annual budget proposals to curb spending on Medicare and Medicaid, his executive orders and other proposals to lower prescription drug prices, and his initiative on hospital price transparency. President Trump’s record on health care provides a window into…
As policymakers debate how to address the high cost of prescription drugs, a new KFF analysis compares data on prescription drug spending and use across large employer plans, Medicare Part D and Medicaid, and provides context for policy discussions about different approaches to curb rising drug costs that would affect people covered by each of the three major payers. The data show that private insurers, Medicare and Medicaid account for 82 percent of retail prescription…
Prescription drug costs are a pressing concern for both consumers and policymakers. This analysis compares prescription drug spending and use in large private employer plans, Medicare Part D, and Medicaid, based primarily on claims data by payer, which does not account for rebates.
In an article in Health Affairs, KFF's Juliette Cubanski, Sarah True and Tricia Neuman, and several other co-authors, explore how often brand-name drugs receive favorable formulary inclusion relative to generics in the Medicare Part D program's prescription drug plans.
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