New program for Medicaid in New Hampshire receives approval

Medicaid health insurance program in New Hampshire

The federal government has given the nod to the managed care plan.

Officials from the federal government have given New Hampshire their approval to move forward with the implementation of a Medicare health insurance program managed care system for the poor and diMedicaid health insurance program in New Hampshiresabled in the state.

The changes to the current system were expected to save the state approximately $16 million.

That savings would have applied to this fiscal year, but unfortunately, it won’t be put into place until the end of the year, so the savings won’t start to apply in any significant way until next year. The changes were made to the managed-care system from the fee for service program that is currently in place.

Back in May, the Executive council had hired three managed care companies to implement the health insurance program.

Those organizations have already started the initial tasks of enrolling providers as well as Medicaid health insurance recipients. The New Hampshire Legislature had already voted to put the Medicare health insurance managed care into place and had included the savings that it was expected to generate into the current budget for the state. In March 2012, the Department of Health and Human Services submitted the amendment to the state’s Medicaid plan to the federal government.

According to Nicholas Toumpas, the DHHS Commissioner, “The Medicaid Care Management Program is an approach to delivering and financing health care that is aimed at both improving the quality of care and reducing costs.” He added that “We have been very thoughtful in our approach and have engaged our stakeholders throughout this process.”

The federal government’s decision has allowed the state to implement a model that will create sustainability into the future for a program that will be reliable for the residents of the state. Governor Lynch explained that within the New Hampshire health insurance and care system, the purpose should be to begin to eliminate the model that charges a fee for the services, and instead place a greater focus on improved preventive and coordinated care.

Lynch feels that achieving this goal will help in controlling costs while boosting the quality of services throughout the health insurance and medical care system as a whole.

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