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This document, prepared by Health Policy Alternatives, Inc., provides a detailed summary of the prescription drug provisions of the Medicare legislation (P.L. 108-173) signed by the President on December 8, 2003. Report (.pdf)
This paper, by Joy Pritts of the Health Policy Institute at Georgetown University, looks at issues related to drug plan marketing activities and privacy under the MMA. Issue Brief (.pdf)
Wednesday, Sept. 8, the Foundation held a policy workshop examining Medicare, health reform and the challenges facing people with disabilities. Younger Medicare beneficiaries with disabilities are much more likely than seniors in the program to report problems accessing and paying for needed medical services, Kaiser Family Foundation researchers report in this Health Affairs article. Based on a national random-sample survey of people on Medicare, the study finds that half of nonelderly disabled beneficiaries report problems…
How these new workforce reductions at the Social Security Administration will affect people is unknown but could make it harder for people to get connected to benefits they might qualify for…which would in turn affect access to health insurance coverage through Medicare and Medicaid.
This report updates a 1997 Foundation report to assess how states are implementing financial protections for the 16 million Medicare beneficiaries who are low-income. These protections, generally referred to as "buy-in programs," help low-income Medicare beneficiaries meet Medicare's cost-sharing requirements by using state Medicaid programs to pay either all or some portion of premiums, deductibles, and coinsurance amounts. Using information collected through a survey of state Medicaid directors and consumer advocates, the update seeks to…
Although Medicare is a national program, there are substantial variations across states and regions in terms of beneficiary characteristics, health needs, and utilization of Medicare-covered services. Likewise, there are also considerable differences in Medicare spending and the emergence of Medicare managed care. In a single resource document, , presents state-by-state demographic data on the Medicare population, along with information on health service utilization, spending, and Medicare HMO penetration. It also provides regional data on the…
Medicare is a critical source of health insurance coverage for virtually all older women in the U.S. and for many younger women who have permanent disabilities. Today, 22 million women one in five adult women rely on Medicare for basic health insurance protection. In fact, women comprise 57% of the Medicare population. Medicare helps to make health care more affordable for older women at a time in their lives when they are most likely to…
The health reform law contains provisions that aim to improve the delivery and coordination of services for persons enrolled in both Medicaid and Medicare, known as the dual eligibles. This population includes individuals with some of the most severely disabling chronic conditions. While the higher costs associated with services to dual eligibles is well-known, information on how spending is distributed across these programs is less understood. This study uses linked Medicare and Medicaid data to…
This report examines the stability of dual eligibility for the seven million Americans who rely on Medicaid to fill the gaps in their Medicare coverage and its implications for Medicare's new prescription drug benefits. The analysis focuses on the duration of dual eligibility, the rates of gain and loss of Medicaid coverage and sources of Medicare supplementation preceding and following periods of Medicaid enrollment. The paper analyzes data from the Medicare Current Beneficiaries Surveys from…
With recent policy debates about the future of Medicaid, the Foundation's Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured has created a resource page of recent publications that address key policy issues when examining Medicaid's role for high cost populations and in long-term care. Of particular interest are a report profiling six Medicaid populations with serious health needs resulting in high costs for the program and a recent analysis showing more than half (52%) of Medicaid…
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