In-person assister availability and plan enrollment in the health insurance marketplace under the Affordable Care Act in the US

9^th Annual European Pharma Congress

June 26-28, 2017 Madrid, Spain

Jayoung Han

Fairleigh Dickinson University, USA

Posters & Accepted Abstracts: Pharmaceut Reg Affairs

Abstract :

Statement of the Problem: The health insurance marketplace under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has run in-person assistance programs to help consumersâ�� plan decisions. Consumers apply for the coverage through the website (healthcare.gov) except for those who live in states running the state-based insurance marketplace. Consumers seek for in-person assistance because they lack confidence to apply on their own and need help understanding the plan choices. Recent attention has been given to developing the decision support tool in hopes to promote consumersâ�� direct engagement in plan decision�¬-making. However, this approach should be taken with caution because of the characteristics of marketplace consumers. They are low�¬ and middle�¬ income population and are less likely to be literate enough to do the plan decision-�¬making on their own. This study aims to describe the county-level assister availability and marketplace enrollment, focusing on the rural-urban differences. Methodology & Theoretical Orientation: The 2016 marketplace enrollment data released by the Department of Health and Human Services and 2015 Small Area Health Insurance Estimates were used for the analysis. The assister data was constructed using healthcare.gov. Four states in the US were analyzed. Wilcoxon Rank-Sum test was performed for the number of assisters and 2016 plan enrollment. Findings: About a quarter of Hispanics in poverty was uninsured in all four states. Uninsured rate was higher among the Hispanics in poverty who are eligible for the premium subsidies compared to all income levels. Marketplace enrollment for 2016 and potential marketplace enrollees vastly varied across counties. The number of potential marketplace enrollees was larger in rural counties than in urban counties. However, percent enrolled in potential enrollees in rural counties was only about half of urban counies. Conclusion & Significance: The results suggest more rigorous outreach efforts on marketplace enrollment in rural areas.

Biography :

Email: jayoung@fdu.edu