Is Your Center Ready for Medicaid Unwinding?

As May approaches, hospitals and health centers are bracing for President Joe Biden’s administration to announce the end of the public health emergency stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic. That federal action will affect Medicaid eligibility. Many states have already begun the task of redetermination, and they are beginning to see implications stemming from lost services. The Association of Clinicians for the Underserved (ACU) estimates 15 million — or half — of the current Medicaid enrollees will be affected by this redetermination of benefits, more commonly called Medicaid unwinding.

ACU has been raising awareness about the change on Capitol Hill and within the medical community. On March 22, the organization hosted a webinar to share best practices and tools to prepare for the redetermination. Additionally, ACU showcased how two health centers are preparing.

Experts from Renaye James Healthcare Advisors listened into the webinar, saying the presentation provided valuable information about overcoming redetermination challenges and using best practices for health care centers to help prevent the loss of patients’ health insurance coverage. There are strategies that centers can use for educating staff, patients, and the community on ways to help identify, engage, and capture patients’ up-to-date information. The following are steps a few centers have taken.

• Create and use a marker in electronic health records (EHR) to indicate that revalidation has been completed.
• Generate reports on patients who do not have this EHR field complete to target outreach.
• Provide information sheets to patients on how to contact their payer or managed care organization.
• Focus marketing blasts to ensure all patients are aware that they have an action to take.

It was clear, according to Alicia Berkowitz, MPH, PMP, Vice President of Programs at Renaye James Healthcare Advisors, that if organizations have not yet begun communicating the Medicaid redetermination to patients, they are behind.

If your center is concerned about the effects of Medicaid unwinding and communicating with your community, connect with Renaye James Healthcare Advisors today!

Access the ACU resources and review the presentation slides.

Thank you, Maria Wyatt-Hobbs and Paula Infield, senior advisors at Renaye James Healthcare Advisors, for contributing to this report.