ACA progress according to Athena and RWJ
Healthcare wonks everywhere are excited that Athenahealth and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation have teamed up to analyze and publish a physician-level view of the impact of the Affordable Care Act. Healthcare industry veteran Josh Gray (whom I first met 20+ years ago at Boston Consulting Group) is leading the effort for Athena. ACAView mines encounter data from tens of thousands of Athenahealth physician customers to answer questions such as:
- Are physicians seeing more new patients in their practices?
- Were new patients sicker than new patients in the past?
- What percent of previously uninsured patients obtained insurance in 2014?
- How did the situation vary between states that expanded Medicaid and those that did not?
The analysis largely demonstrates that ACA implementation is going smoothly and that non-Medicaid expansion states are shooting themselves in the foot. In particular:
- Physicians are not being overwhelmed with new patients
- New patients are not sicker
- Uninsured rates have fallen significantly everywhere, with much sharper drops in Medicaid expansion states
- The ACA has eliminated age disparities in coverage
Check out the full report for the details.—By healthcare business consultant David E. Williams, president of Health Business Group.