Wild Blue Health Solutions

Medicaid insights from Kaiser Family Foundation: Who may be at Risk as Continuous Enrollment Ends

Wild Blue — Sun, 05 Mar 2023 16:16:29 +0000

Medicaid Enrollment Growth: Estimates by State and Eligibility Group Show Who may be at Risk as Continuous Enrollment Ends

“Millions of people could lose coverage when the continuous enrollment provision ends, reversing recent gains in coverage.”

Who are the uninsured in Texas?

Wild Blue — Fri, 03 Mar 2023 18:30:09 +0000

The “Texas 2036” organization has launched a groundbreaking, multi-year study to find out why millions of Texans remain uninsured. The Texas 2036 study seeks to create a more holistic understanding of Texas’ uninsured population — the largest in the country — and to better identify barriers and personal decisions that result in Texans not having access to affordable care. Learn more about the study and the work of Texas 2036 here.

Did the family glitch fix, actually fix the family glitch?

Wild Blue — Wed, 15 Feb 2023 16:38:00 +0000

We at Wild Blue tend to celebrate policy updates that result in more people covered with access to care. We really get excited when people can obtain high quality, affordable coverage, for example purchasing ACA-Compliant health insurance through Healthcare.gov.

For several years, the so-called “family glitch” interrupted good news about available APTCs (Advanced Premium Tax Credits) helping make ACA Marketplace health insurance more affordable. Fixing the “family glitch” should be a major celebration, although we have some questions about how well the glitch fix, well, fixes the glitch.

Here is recent guidance from CMS with insights about the updated policies for employees and employers. We would love to learn your thoughts: please comment and let us know if this is the policy solution you were hoping would be made available.

Interview: Ken Janda talks with Houston Public Media about access to medicine

Wild Blue — Fri, 10 Feb 2023 18:27:00 +0000

The Thursday, February 9, 2023, edition of “Houston Matters” covers several important health-related stories and interviews. Wild Blue’s Ken Janda joins the conversation about halfway through the show, approximately the 23 minute mark, to discuss why health insurance companies sometimes ask patients to try some medicines before other medicines.

We encourage you to listen to the entire show, including insights into domestic violence trends.

Texas adds 570,000 to affordable health care plans, leading all states in newly insured

Wild Blue — Mon, 06 Feb 2023 18:11:00 +0000

There is nothing good about Texas having the most uninsured people of any state in America, whether as a percentage of the population or as raw figures representing individual uninsured human lives. However, it does provide plenty of opportunities to see that people want health insurance, as demonstrated in Texans’ historic surge during the recent “open enrollment” season for ACA-compliant coverage via Healthcare.gov.

The Dallas Morning News has good news coverage of the record-breaking sign-ups in Texas:

The newly insured pushed Texas over the 2.4 million mark for residents seeking coverage on HealthCare.gov during the open enrollment period that ended Jan. 15, according to federal data. That’s a record high for the Lone Star State and more than double the total from three years ago.

Celebrating: Center for Health Equity launches at UTHealth Houston School of Public Health

Wild Blue — Thu, 02 Feb 2023 16:40:00 +0000

We have been early explorers and investors into what was for many years called the “social determinants of health” or SDOH. While some people intuitively understand the importance of non-medical influences or drivers of health outcomes, the institutional health infrastructure systems typically did not officially recognize non-medical drivers of health outcomes nor did they – and this is crucial – create provider reimbursements or provider codes for non-medical organizations that contribute to better outcomes.

Today, we are celebrating the launch of the Center for Health Equity headquartered at UTHealth Houston School of Public Health.

If you’re new to the conversation around non-medical influences on health outcomes, here are two useful situations to consider as examples:

1 – Food. Imagine you live in a “food desert” with no easily reachable grocery stores selling fresh produce. Instead, your neighborhood has lots of small convenience stores offering packaged and highly processed food products. Eating gas station hot dogs and salty chips, plus drinking lots of 99¢ sodas, will create generally worse health outcomes than eating fresh fruit and vegetables, right? We’re not talking about once a year, or even once a month, grilled hot dogs with spicy chips and pickles at a picnic. We’re talking daily consumption of highly processed foodstuff containing little if any nutritional value, which plays havoc with our health.

2 – Money. Generally, the more money we have, the healthier our lives. Not always, of course! Sometimes wonderfully healthy people have no money and few resources, but study after study shows that Americans in low-wage jobs tend to have significantly worse health outcomes than wealthy Americans who otherwise have similar characteristics (age, ethnicity, etc.). Why? Americans working low-wage jobs tend to lack access to care, including lacking time in their schedules to visit a doctor or clinic during normal working hours.

While both money and food are relatively quick dots to connect as non-medical influences on health outcomes, the full scope is both broader and deeper. Wild Blue and many of our colleagues have been in these conversations for years, investing in research, pilot programs, and evidence-based solutions.

Systemic solutions: One of the early pieces of positive progress is payor codes for known health influencers, for example, being able to reimburse a regional food bank for delivering fresh produce or even meals.

We are glad the new Center for Health Equity will “create, advance, and sustain research opportunities spanning the continuum of care to improve understanding of disease and health disparities, including the structural, behavioral, environmental, social, economic, and health literacy factors related to the prevention and control of chronic disease across the lifespan.”

We look forward to seeing what the Center and its colleagues and partners will create.

Improving the Health of Texas

admin — Mon, 12 Apr 2021 21:22:00 +0000

Our updated overview of health coverage, care, and costs is available for download. It includes “7 Steps to a Comprehensive Texas Solution” for covering all Texans with access to care.

Health-Healthcare-Insurance-for-Rice-031821-1 Download

Opinion: Texas can’t afford to pass on Medicaid expansion

Wild Blue — Wed, 31 Mar 2021 21:52:00 +0000

It doesn’t get clearer than this: expanding Medicaid strengthens the Texas economy, improves Texans’ health, and benefits people and companies all across the state, in rural and urban areas. Please read more from Elena Marks of Episcopal Health Foundation, in the Houston Chronicle.

EHF recently published a poll showing sweeping support among Texans for Medicaid Expansion. You can review the survey here.

A Biden win sows hope in health care sector

admin — Tue, 10 Nov 2020 21:17:00 +0000

For Houston hospitals and the region’s health care industry, a Biden presidency could bring more economic relief for medical providers that have struggled under the costs of COVID-19 care and more stability to health care policy, which became uncertain under Trump, said Ken Janda, a former insurance executive and adjunct professor of health policy management at Rice University.

“The markets are all assuming nothing terrible is going to happen to the Affordable Care Act and Congress is not going to be able to mess with it much,” Janda said “Now that Biden has been elected, that has eliminated uncertainty.”

Read the rest of this story in the Houston Chronicle

Will individuals see the savings from insurance pandemic relief? Not quite

Wild Blue — Thu, 15 Oct 2020 15:42:56 +0000

In a conversation with Houston Chronicle reporter Gwendolyn Wu, Wild Blue’s founder Ken Janda noted that insurers must guess whether it’s a better financial move to reimburse customers now in the form of premium credits, or to wait until next year and see if there’s pent-up demand from people who put off care in 2020.

“All of those services are down and save the insurance company money this year because they don’t have to pay those claims, but could potentially cost them money next year or the year after,” Janda said.

Read the full story here, including additional insights from Wild Blue Health Solutions.