Will Medicaid expansion under ObamaCare be effective? New study says 'No'

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A new study recently released in the New England Journal of Medicine analyzed data from 10,000 low-income individuals randomly selected to apply for Medicaid coverage, comparing them to an identical group of people who did not have access to it.  The study, known as the Oregon Health Study, hoped to verify the effect expanded health care coverage had on individuals’ health and wellbeing.

The ultimate result: Expanded coverage did not improve individual health outcomes.  In fact, the results could be considered more harmful than positive.

RELATED: New study looks at how expanded Medicaid coverage affects individual health

This research is the perfect template to analyze whether or not ObamaCare is going to be an effective tool in making Americans healthier.  Some of the parameters the study measured included blood pressure, cholesterol, hemoglobin A1c, screening for depression, self-reported diagnosis, health care utilization and out-of-pocket expenses.

This was a randomized controlled study, and the conclusion was quite startling to me.  Despite the fact that there was expanded Medicaid coverage, it really did not significantly improve the health outcomes of the participants in the first two years of coverage.  But it did raise some negative aspects, such as individuals spending more on their health care needs and increased use of health care services.

There were some positive findings. Medicaid expansion did help doctors pick up more diabetes diagnoses, and individuals reported lower rates of depression as well as a reduced financial burden on the participants’ families.

However, while diabetes was detected more, the Oregon study really did not show a reduction in blood pressure, cholesterol or hemoglobin A1c levels, which are active measures of diabetic management.

What scares me the most is that this offers a false sense of hope for individuals, because it is showing little actual health benefits.  What it really is doing is increasing the cost of health care, and that is just a bad formula for our future.

This is a perfect example of how politics and medicine don’t mix.

Dr. Manny Alvarez

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New study looks at how expanded Medicaid coverage affects individual health

Published May 02, 2013

FoxNews.com

When the Affordable Care Act comes into play this January, millions of adults will have new health insurance coverage through Medicaid.

The New York Times recently posed this question: How will that change their finances, use of available medical services and ultimately their health?

A new study called the Oregon Health Study in Wednesday’s New England Journal of Medicine may have those answers, The Times reported.

The study looked at thousands of low-income individuals in Oregon who had access to Medicaid and compared them to an identical group of people who did not have access to it.

The study discovered those who had Medicaid ended up spending more on their health care needs, visited the doctor more often and even went to the hospital more. 

However, the study proposes these individuals were not necessarily healthier during the time the research was conducted. This was measured by looking at their blood pressure, blood sugar and other factors. 

The low-income individuals with Medicaid had less depression and felt more secure financially, according to the study.

“There was this view that Medicaid coverage would not do much for the low-income uninsured, either because they had access to charity care or because Medicaid is not good insurance,” said Amy Finkelstein of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who worked on the Oregon Health Study. “This rejects that notion entirely.”

There are currently about 50 million people in the U.S. who receive Medicaid – and nearly all of them are poor. However, most states do not provide Medicaid to adults who do not have disabilities or dependent children, even if they are low-income, The Times said.

So the country will spend more by “hundreds of billions of dollars over time,” because of all the newcomers this January, the Times said.

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