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Medicaid Benefits For Addiction Treatment Expanded After Implementation Of The Affordable Care Act
- Source :
- Health affairs (Project Hope). 37(8)
- Publication Year :
- 2018
-
Abstract
- The Affordable Care Act (ACA) established a minimum standard of insurance benefits for addiction treatment and expanded federal parity regulations to selected Medicaid benefit plans, which required state Medicaid programs to make changes to their addiction treatment benefits. We surveyed Medicaid programs in all fifty states and the District of Columbia regarding their addiction treatment benefits and utilization controls in standard and alternative benefit plans in 2014 and 2017, when plans were subject to ACA parity requirements. The number of state plans that provided benefits for residential treatment and opioid use disorder medications increased substantially. States imposing annual service limits on outpatient addiction treatment decreased by over 50 percent. Fewer states required preauthorization for services, with the largest reductions for medications treating opioid use disorder. The ACA may have prompted state Medicaid programs to expand addiction treatment benefits and reduce utilization controls in alternative benefit plans. This trend was also observed among standard Medicaid plans not subject to ACA parity laws, which suggests a potential spillover effect.
- Subjects :
- medicine.medical_specialty
Medicaid
Substance-Related Disorders
030503 health policy & services
Health Policy
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
Insurance Coverage
United States
Article
03 medical and health sciences
0302 clinical medicine
Family medicine
medicine
Health insurance
030212 general & internal medicine
Business
Insurance benefit
0305 other medical science
Addiction treatment
Health reform
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 15445208
- Volume :
- 37
- Issue :
- 8
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Health affairs (Project Hope)
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....336aad21d84b052d4a5362515957b10c