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KFF’s policy research provides facts and analysis on a wide range of policy issues and public programs.
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.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the organization’s core operating programs.
State Health Facts is a KFF project that provides free, up-to-date, and easy-to-use health data for all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the United States. It offers data on specific types of health insurance coverage, including employer-sponsored, Medicaid, Medicare, as well as people who are uninsured by demographic characteristics, including age, race/ethnicity, work status, gender, and income. There are also data on health insurance status for a state's population overall and broken down by age, gender, and income.
This brief provides key data on the South and the current status of health and health coverage in the South to provide greater insight into the health needs in the region and the potential coverage gains that may be achieved through the ACA. It includes data on the uninsured, Medicaid expansion and eligibility for coverage.
This brief profiles four states that were the first to receive federal approval to take up a state option under the Affordable Care Act to implement health homes for Medicaid beneficiaries with chronic conditions. Almost half of the 9 million people who qualify for Medicaid on the basis of disability suffer from mental illness and 45 percent have three or more diagnosed chronic conditions. Health homes provide an important tool for states trying to manage…
This report provides an early look at state efforts to prepare for health reform, examining the experiences to date in five states (Connecticut, Michigan, Massachusetts, North Carolina and Washington). The report finds that the state political environment and expected leadership transitions create uncertainties and are already factoring into state strategies on health reform implementation. State leaders dealing with an aging workforce, hiring constraints, and the toll from the recession also see a need for additional…
One of the first provisions that would be implemented under federal health reform bills in the House and the Senate would establish a national high-risk pool program to offer coverage to otherwise uninsurable individuals during the interim period between enactment and implementation of broader health care reforms. High-risk pools provide a safety net for people who are denied coverage by private insurers due to their health. Most states that permit insurers to decline applicants for…
This document contains the chartpack from the November Health Tracking Poll. The survey was designed and analyzed by public opinion researchers at the Kaiser Family Foundation and was conducted November 5 through November 12, 2009, among a nationally representative random sample of 1,203 adults ages 18 and older. Telephone interviews conducted by landline (802) and cell phone (401, including 112 who had no landline telephone) were carried out in English and Spanish. The margin of…
There is lots of apocalyptic talk these days about the collapse of the newspaper industry and the challenges facing news organizations. There is even talk of the unimaginable, my hometown paper The Boston Globe shutting down. Surely they know that Red Sox Nation cannot exist without the Globe Sports pages. All kinds of solutions have been proposed, from micro-payments for news stories like songs on iTunes to foundation-endowed daily newspapers. There is growing talk of…
This report, based on discussions with leading state Medicaid directors in May 2010, examines how Medicaid agencies are preparing for a lead role in implementing health reform while continuing to deal with the impact of the recession. The report augments the most recent annual Medicaid budget survey report, released in September 2009, and a mid-year update report released in February 2010. NOTE: Updated report on fiscal years 2010 and 2011 now available. Report (.pdf)
The Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured convened a roundtable discussion on June 23, 2010 with a group of federal and state officials and experts to discuss key issues related to reaching, enrolling and delivering care to adults in Medicaid under health reform. The discussion focused in particular on non-disabled adults without dependent children (often referred to as "childless adults") who have historically been ineligible for the program. When the new coverage goes into…
This brief explores key provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) for people with HIV, and the opportunities and challenges for using the law to improve HIV care, particularly in light of the Supreme Court's 2012 ruling on the law.
This policy brief examines the underlying shifts in health insurance coverage in 2007, which resulted in a 1.5 million decrease in the number of uninsured people under age 65, due to increased public coverage. This includes about 300,000 in Massachusetts, which implemented its comprehensive health reform that year. The brief also projects that the current economic downturn and rising unemployment rate likely will cause the number of uninsured to grow by at least 2 million…
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