A recent study has shown that the new healthcare reforms in Massachusetts have failed to decrease the pressure on providers for those in the lowest income brackets.
Between the years of 2005 and 2009, the number of visits to community health centers rose by 31 percent, and public and charity hospitals also experienced a notable increase in their number of patients.
Leader of the study, Leighton Ku, who is the head of the George Washington University Center for Health Policy Research, said that there are a number of things that the nationwide health care reform will be able to learn from the study’s findings.
Ku explained that one of the primary concerns is the way in which “we can rein in spending in healthcare, so there will be a certain temptation to cut back on the funding to safety-net providers.” He went on to state that cutting funding will only cause greater harm to the system because there will continue to be a large number of people who will be using those services regardless of the healthcare overhauls.
The data used by Ku and the research team was gleaned from the community health center and hospital information collected in the 2009 Massachusetts Health Reform Survey, in which there were 3,000 adult participants.
The recently enacted Health Safety Net program or sometimes referred to as free care has made it necessary for all of the residents of Massachusetts to obtain health insurance, and it provided subsidies for individuals whose insurance provided only limited coverage or who were completely uninsured. The legislation was enacted in 2006 in that state, and was fully implemented in 2008 by former Governor Mitt Romney – who is now opposed to the current reforms to national health legislation.
Ku noted that though there was a dramatic drop in the number of people who were uninsured, the safety-net provider uses continued to climb.
For more information on Massachusetts health insurance program you call: 1-877-910-2100
