Abstract
Policies Affecting Medicare-Medicaid Dual-Eligible Enrollees’ Access to Healthcare and Health Outcomes
Rebecca Staiger, PhD, Assistant Professor Health Policy and Management, University of California, Berkeley
For low-income US adults aged 65 and older and for individuals with qualifying disabilities, dually enrolling in Medicaid and Medicare can reduce financial hardships created by cost-sharing policies in Medicare. Medicaid pays for all cost-sharing for dually enrolled individuals (“duals”) in the Qualified Medicare Beneficiary (QMB) program, though the required cost-sharing amount varies by state. The impact of these cost-sharing policies on care for duals remains poorly understood, both in terms of their own care-seeking behavior and their potential loss of access to providers unwilling to accept Medicaid. We propose to fill this gap in knowledge by using national-level Medicare and Medicaid claims data from 2008 to the most current year available to explore the impact of changes in reimbursement rates on duals’ access to care, healthcare utilization, and health outcomes