Fifty Years of Medicaid

For the past fifty days - by posting program highlights, research findings and the voices of our beneficiaries - we hope we have successfully illuminated the importance of Medicaid to the health of our families, our neighbors and our nation. We aimed to demonstrate how Medicaid has made a...

As states expand their Medicaid programs, many people who have never had health coverage before, or who have been uninsured for a long time, are signing up and using their new health care benefits. Here are just two stories shared by people who are newly enrolled in Medicaid. Listen to their voices:

Efforts are underway to modernize managed care for Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) beneficiaries. On May 26, 2015, CMS issued proposed regulations that would update the programs’ rules for the first time in more than a decade. The proposal aims to strengthen the...

Extending health coverage to more low-income people is an important way to reduce health disparities between people of color and others in the United States. An analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that the Medicaid expansion particularly affects people of color, given that they are more...

Recent research published by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that health coverage expansion confers substantial benefits on children when they reach adulthood. The longitudinal study used administrative data from the IRS to examine the effects of children’s eligibility in...

CMS is committed to combating Medicaid provider fraud, waste and abuse, and is using educational resources and state-of-the-art methods to do so. A major purpose of CMS Program Integrity efforts is to ensure that correct payments are made to legitimate Medicaid (and Medicare) providers for covered...

When patients are uninsured or underinsured, or unable to pay out of pocket for health care services, hospitals and other providers may incur the costs of the uncompensated care. Providers may shift these costs to other consumers.

Recent headlines were startling: In states that expanded Medicaid, new diagnoses of diabetes increased 23% , while in states that have not expanded, the increase was just 0.4%. But, according to health care professionals, that’s good news! When financial barriers to care were reduced, more...

The Commonwealth Fund Biennial Health Insurance Survey , 2014, explores the experiences of adults with private insurance and Medicaid beneficiaries who had coverage for a full year, as well as adults who were uninsured for some time during the year. The survey asked individuals about the quality of...

Following the Marketplace’s second open enrollment period, the Commonwealth Fund’s Affordable Care Act’s Tracking Survey interviewed a nationally representative sample of adults, including adults with Medicaid coverage or those who might be eligible for it. The survey took place...