Change in facility-level share of Medicaid patients with cancer following implementation of the affordable care act.

Abstract

e18543 Background: Although Medicaid expansions associated with the Affordable Care Act (ACA) significantly increased insurance coverage for Americans with cancer, there is evidence that some facilities limit the number of Medicaid patients they treat due to lower reimbursement. We aimed to assess facility-level changes in the proportion of patients with Medicaid who were diagnosed with cancer in relation to Medicaid expansions associated with the ACA. Methods: We identified adult patients with the 19 most commonly diagnosed cancers using the National Cancer Database who were diagnosed with cancer from 2010 through 2017. We clustered Commission on Cancer (CoC) accredited institutions and included those diagnosing at least 10 patients in each year. The primary study endpoint was the change in the proportion of Medicaid-insured individuals relative to the implementation of the ACA (pre- and post-Jan 1, 2014). We used adjusted difference-in-differences (DID) estimation and multivariable logistic regression to examine patient and facility-level factors associated with changes in the proportion of Medicaid insured individuals. Results: We identified 1,064 eligible facilities in the study period. There were considerable changes in the share of Medicaid insured patients at the facility-level (range -20.0% to +44.7%, IQR -0.64% to +5.63%). There were significantly larger changes in facilities located in Medicaid expansion states (11.5 to 16.5% percentage points) versus non-expansion states (9.2 to 8.9% percentage points) with adjusted DID +5.79% (p < 0.001). Despite overall increases, 14.6% of facilities in expansion states experienced reductions in their share of Medicaid insured patients. Facility factors associated with decreasing share of Medicaid patients were non-expansion status (OR: 6.25, 95% CI 3.89 – 9.98, p < 0.001) and higher baseline Medicaid population (OR: 2.93, 95% CI 2.00 – 4.35, p < 0.001). There was also significant regional variation with larger decreases in the West South Central (OR: 5.86, 95% CI 2.30 – 15.74, p < 0.001) and West North Central (OR: 2.46, 95% CI 1.07 – 5.87, p = 0.037) regions. Conclusions: Although state expansions associated with the ACA led to increases in the share of Medicaid-insured patients diagnosed with cancer at CoC facilities, there was considerable variation in changes at the facility-level. These findings highlight that improved insurance coverage may not be sufficient to improve access to care, and facility-level policies may remain a source of access disparity.