Filter

21 - 30 of 52 Results

  • Providing Outreach and Enrollment Assistance: Lessons Learned from Community Health Centers in Massachusetts

    Issue Brief

    As states and communities gear up to provide outreach and enrollment assistance under the ACA, the enrollment assistance experience of health centers in Massachusetts, where a major expansion of health coverage was implemented six years ago, offers valuable lessons that can help to inform current and emerging efforts by health centers and other community-based organizations to reach and enroll millions of low-income, uninsured Americans in health insurance.

  • Health Center Patient Trends, Enrollment Activities, and Service Capacity: Recent Experience in Medicaid Expansion and Non-Expansion States

    Issue Brief

    In thousands of medically underserved communities across the U.S., community health centers enroll low-income people in health coverage and provide care to millions of patients. Against the backdrop of significant health center expansion over several years and a full year of expanded health coverage under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), this brief examines change between 2013 and 2014 in the volume and health coverage profile of health center patients, and health center enrollment activities and…

  • Survey Finds Many Primary Care Physicians Have Negative Views of the Use of Quality Metrics and Penalties for Unnecessary Hospital Readmissions 

    News Release

    Primary Care Providers View Health IT as Improving Quality, But Tilt Negatively on ACOs Half of the nation's primary care physicians view the increased use of quality-of-care metrics and financial penalties for unnecessary hospitalizations as potentially troubling for patient care, according to a new survey from The Commonwealth Fund and the Kaiser Family Foundation. Fifty percent of primary care physicians say the increased use of quality metrics to assess provider performance is having a negative…

  • Community Health Centers in a Time of Change: Results from an Annual Survey

    Issue Brief

    With health centers playing an important role in the response to the coronavirus pandemic, findings from the KFF/Geiger Gibson 2019 Community Health Center Survey provide important information on health centers’ financial situation and their experiences in a changing policy environment. After years of growth following implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), changes in Medicaid, public charge, and Title X family planning policies, among others, carry important implications for low-income patients as well as health…

  • Impact of Shifting Immigration Policy on Medicaid Enrollment and Utilization of Care among Health Center Patients

    Issue Brief

    On August 14, 2019, the Trump administration published a final rule to broaden the programs the federal government will consider in public charge determinations to include Medicaid coverage for non-pregnant adults and certain previously excluded nutrition and housing programs. To learn about the possible early effects of the public charge rule and other immigration policies on patients at community health centers, this brief draws on interviews and survey data to capture health center directors’ and…

  • Community Health Center Financing: The Role of Medicaid and Section 330 Grant Funding Explained

    Issue Brief

    This issue brief describes the two primary sources of health center revenue—Medicaid and Section 330 grant funding. The evolution of these funding streams has contributed to significant growth in the health center program, enabling expanded services to millions of additional residents of the nation’s most medically underserved rural and urban communities.

  • Quality of Care in Community Health Centers and Factors Associated with Performance

    Issue Brief

    This study examines quality among health centers relative to Medicaid managed care organizations (MCOs). Chronic care quality among health centers is high; gaps in women’s preventive care are a concern. Lower-performing health centers have very high uninsured and homeless rates. The expansion of Medicaid and private insurance under the ACA may foster gains in health center quality performance.

  • Community Health Centers: A 2013 Profile and Prospects as ACA Implementation Proceeds

    Issue Brief

    Community health centers are an integral part of the health care safety-net, providing access to care for nearly 22 million people in underserved communities. The ACA established trust fund for health center growth, and with increased patient revenues attributable to expanded coverage, health centers’ grant funding to support care of the uninsured can go further. This brief provides a 2013 data profile of health centers; highlights pre-ACA differences between health centers in Medicaid expansion and…