Psychology of consulting and coaching
MILITARY MEDICINE, 184, 1/2:e76, 2019
Recent Changes in Health Insurance Coverage for Urban and Rural Veterans: Evidence from the First Year of the Affordable
Care Act
Michel Boudreaux, PhD*; Deanna Barath, MPH*; Lynn A. Blewett, PhD†
ABSTRACT Introduction: Prior to the Affordable Care Act, as many as 1.3 million veterans lacked health insurance. With the passage of the Affordable Care Act, veterans now have new pathways to coverage through Medicaid expan- sion in those states that chose to expand Medicaid and through private coverage options offered through the Health Insurance Marketplace. We examined the impact of the ACA on health insurance coverage for veterans in expansion and non-expansion states and for urban and rural veterans. Methods: We examined changes in veterans’ health insur- ance coverage following the first year of the ACA, focusing on whether they lived in an urban or rural area and whether they live in a Medicaid expansion state. We used data on approximately 200,000 non-elderly community- dwelling veterans, obtained from the 2013–2014 American Community Survey and estimated differences in the adjusted probability of being uninsured between 2013 and 2014 for both urban and rural areas. Adjusted probabilities were computed by fitting logistic regressions controlling for age, gender, race, marital status, poverty status, education, and employment. Results: There were an estimated 10.1 million U.S. non-elderly veterans in 2013; 82% lived in pre- dominantly urban areas (8.3 million), and the remaining 18% (1.8 million) lived in predominately rural areas. Most veterans lived in the South (43.6%), and rural veterans were more likely to be Southerners than their urban counter- parts. On every marker of economic well-being, rural veterans fared worse than urban veterans. They had a statistically significant higher chance of having incomes below 138% of FPG (20.0% versus 17.0%), of being out of the labor force (29.1% versus 23.0%), and of having no more than a high school education (39.6% versus 28.8%). Rural veterans were also more likely to experience at least one functional limitation. Overall, veterans in Medicaid expansion states experienced a significantly larger increase in insurance compared to veterans living in non-expansion states. For rural veterans in Medicaid expansion states, the increase in insurance was 3.5 percentage points, compared with 1.2 percent- age points in non-expansion states. Conclusion: Our analysis found a substantial 24% relative decline in the rate of uninsurance for U.S. Veterans, from 9.3 to 7.1% between 2013 and 2014. We found that coverage gains in rural areas were due to gains in Medicaid and individual market coverage. Residence in a Medicaid expansion state was particu- larly influential for rural veterans – the increase in the insured rate was three times larger in Medicaid expansion states versus non-expansion states. The ACA has had a positive and significant impact on the ability of U.S. Veterans to obtain health insurance coverage specifically for low-income veterans living in rural areas. The poverty rate among Veterans is rising and is particularly an issue for the more recent Gulf War veterans. Providing affordable and accessi- ble health insurance options is part of our commitment to those who have served our country. Our analysis also pre- sents yet another reason for the 17 non-expansion states to consider a Medicaid expansion.
INTRODUCTION There are more veterans living in the USA today than at any other time since WWII.1 While the Department of Veterans’ Affairs (VA) plays an important role in providing health care services to veterans through the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), 55% of veterans rely on care obtained through employer-sponsored health insurance or public pro- grams like Medicare and Medicaid.2 In addition, approxi- mately 1.3 million non-elderly veterans lacked comprehensive health insurance and did not access VHA health services in
2010.3 Given that many veterans are covered outside of the VHA while others lack any coverage at all, recent health reform initiatives have the potential to substantially affect veterans’ access to health care.
The passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in 2010 created new coverage options for veterans. Eligible veterans may now obtain health insurance coverage through newly formed Health Insurance Marketplaces with tax credits for those that qualify. The ACA also allowed states to expand their Medicaid program to non-elderly adults with incomes below 138% of the poverty level (or $16,100 of annual income for a single adult in 2014).4 As of early 2016, 31 states and the District of Columbia expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, 2 states are considering expansion, and 17 states have no plans to expand.5
Although the full implementation of the ACA is only in its third year (as of 2016), recent research suggests that, in the general population, it is having substantial impacts on health insurance coverage, access to care, and self-reported
*School of Public Health, University of Maryland, 4200 Valley Dr #3310A, College Park, MD 20742.
†School of Public Health, University of Minnesota, 420 Delaware St SE #Mmc88, Minneapolis, MN 55455.
The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily rep- resent the views of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
doi: 10.1093/milmed/usy053 © Association of Military Surgeons of the United States 2018. All rights
reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.
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health.6–9 Recent estimates from the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) suggest that between 2013 and the first three quarters of 2015, the number of uninsured persons declined by 16 million.9 Reductions in the uninsured have been the largest for people with lower incomes, Hispanics, and residents of states that opted to expand Medicaid. There is little evidence to date regarding changes in coverage for rural versus urban populations, but one recent study suggests that individuals in rural areas were less likely to sign up for coverage in the Health Insurance Marketplace compared to people in urban areas.10
Reductions in the uninsured have been accompanied by increases in the number of non- elderly adults that report having a regular physician, a decrease in the fraction of non- elderly adults that needed but could not afford care, and a decrease in the number that report being in fair or poor health.6 To date, there is limited evidence of substantial declines in labor force participation,11 and the rate of employer-sponsored insurance has also remained steady, suggesting that consumers have not substituted private cov- erage for new public coverage options (i.e., “crowd-out”).9
Given their distinct demographic profile, health needs, and the dedicated health systems serving them, veterans are likely to be affected by the ACA in unique ways. Several published reports have estimated the potential of the ACA to reduce the number of uninsured veterans by estimating how many uninsured veterans would be income eligible for either Medicaid or for tax credits through a Marketplace. The Urban Institute estimated that half of all uninsured veterans in 2010–2013 had incomes below 138% of the poverty level, but 400,000 of these had incomes below 100% of the pov- erty level, making them ineligible for financial assistance through a Health Insurance Marketplace for veterans living in states that did not expand Medicaid.12 A more recent report estimated that 25% of uninsured veterans would be eligible for Medicaid, even with half of the states not expanding their Medicaid programs, and 46% would be eli- gible for subsidized coverage through federal and state- based marketplace options.3
The 5.3 million veterans living in rural areas face specific health care concerns.13
Compared with urban veterans, rural veterans tend to have lower health status, including higher levels of hyperten- sion, diabetes mellitus, hyperlipidemia, post-traumatic stress disorder, and depressive disorder.6 Rural veterans also face challenging social barriers to care including lack of transpor- tation, substandard housing, low levels of education, high rates of unemployment and low rates of labor force partici- pation.2 Rural veterans also are more likely to live further away from a VHA facility, and thus non-VHA coverage options may be particularly important for them.14
In this study, we examined changes in health insurance coverage during the first year of full implementation of the ACA (from 2013 to 2014) for non-elderly urban and rural veterans. Our analysis investigated if rural and urban
veterans that lived in states that expanded Medicaid experi- enced more coverage gains than those that lived in states not expanding Medicaid coverage. We also examined if changes in coverage differed by income.
METHODS We obtained data on veterans from the 2013 and 2014 American Community Survey (ACS), a nationally represen- tative survey conducted by the US Census Bureau. In 2014, the Census Bureau reported a 96.7% response rate.15 The primary advantage of the ACS is its large sample size which allows for detailed analysis of relatively small subgroups such as veterans living in rural areas. In 2014, the public-use sample included 3.1 million person records. Ethical stan- dards were used in this research. All data used in this study were publicly available secondary data with no individual identifiers. No human subjects were involved.
Veterans We defined veterans as those who reported that they served “On active duty in the past, but not now.” We restricted our analysis to veterans age 18–64 that dwell in the community (i.e., are not institutionalized). Overall, our analytical sample size in the pooled 2013–2014 file was 199,398 persons.
Rural and Urban Designation The lowest level of geography in the public-use ACS is the Public Use Microdata Area (PUMA), a Census geography that is state specific and contains approximately 100,000 people. In populated areas there are multiple PUMAs per county, but in sparsely populated regions, PUMAs consist of multiple counties. We defined rural as living in a PUMA in which at least 50% of the PUMA’s population lived in a rural Census Block, as defined by the Census Bureau. All other observations were considered to be urban. The rural/ urban data were obtained from the Missouri Census Data Center.16 Median population density for the PUMAs we classified as urban was 1,613 people per square mile com- pared with 55 people per square mile for the rural PUMAs.
Health Insurance Coverage We examined six types of health insurance coverage: (1) Employer-sponsored insurance (including Tri-Care); (2) Non-VHA public coverage (Medicare, Medicaid, and other public sources for those with low-incomes or a disability); (3) Coverage purchased directly from an insurance company which includes non-group coverage purchased on or off the exchanges; (4) Those obtaining care from the VHA, regard- less of other coverage types they report; (5) Those who list no other source of coverage except VHA care; and (6) The uninsured (those not reporting any coverage type). We dis- tinguished between veterans that had VHA care in any com- bination with other coverage and veterans that had only
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VHA coverage because changes in each group has different policy significance. In our results and tables we refer to ser- vices obtained from the VHA as VA coverage to be consis- tent with the ACS questionnaire wording (which uses “VA”).
Other Covariates We included the following control variables: age (18–34, 35–44, 45–64); gender (male/female); race (non-Hispanic White, non-Hispanic Black, non-Hispanic Other Race, Hispanic); marital status (not married/married); educational attainment (high school graduate or less, some college or associates degree, Bachelor’s degree or more); employment (unemployed, part-time, full-time, or not in the labor force); functional difficulties arising from sensory, mobility, cogni- tive, or independent living limitations, service connected status (yes/no); and most recent era of military service (Vietnam or before, 1975–1990, Gulf Era, Since 9/11). We use the race/ethnicity classification included in the ACS.
We created a measure of family income and determined poverty levels using Federal Poverty Guidelines (FPG) to create four income categories: 0–138% FPG, 139–249% FPG, 250–399% FPG, and ≥ 400% FPG. These groups cor- respond to the income thresholds for the new ACA Medicaid expansion population, the population eligible for premium tax credits and cost-sharing reductions in the Health Insurance Marketplaces, the population eligible for premium tax credits but not costs-sharing reductions, and those not eligible for any financial assistance, respectively. We also grouped our observations of veterans living in states that had expanded Medicaid by the start of 2014 versus those living in states that had not expanded Medicaid.17
Statistical Analysis We began by describing the characteristics of the urban and rural non-elderly veteran population in the baseline period (2013). Next, we examined unadjusted changes in coverage type between 2013 and 2014, overall and for urban and rural veterans separately. Finally, we estimated differences in the adjusted probability of being insured (any type of coverage) between 2013 and 2014. We stratified the sample by urban and rural status and computed these differences separately for each strata. Adjusted probabilities were computed by fit- ting logistic regressions that included year and controls for age, gender, race, marital status, poverty status, educational attainment, and employment. Two separate versions of the model were run: one that interacted year with Medicaid expansion status and another that interacted year with income category. We used t-tests to determine statistical sig- nificance at the p < 0.05 level. Coefficient estimates were converted to a probability scale for ease of interpretation.18
More details of our statistic model can be found in the Supplementary materials.
Limitations Potential limitations to our study included the constraints imposed by the ACS on how we defined urban/rural status. Because the lowest level of geography was PUMAs and PUMA boundaries might encompass both urban and rural communities, our measure might have led to misclassifica- tion (we explore this issue more thoroughly in the Supplementary material). In addition, there was a change in the way veter- ans were identified in the ACS starting in 2013. As a result, we were only able to examine changes in coverage between 2013 and 2014. The lack of a substantial pre-period pre- vented us from determining if the changes we observed were simply a continuation of long-standing trends. However, data from other sources suggest stable rates going back at least to 2011.19 Furthermore, our results are in line with a growing body of literature which finds that the ACA is associ- ated with increased coverage and access to care, independent of other factors.20
RESULTS Table I presents baseline characteristics of non-elderly veter- ans by urban and rural status.
Overall, we estimated 10.1 million U.S. non-elderly veter- ans in 2013; 82% lived in predominantly urban PUMAs (8.3 million), and the remaining 18% (1.8 million) lived in pre- dominately rural PUMAs.
Most veterans lived in the South (43.6%), and rural veter- ans were more likely to be Southerners than their urban counterparts (P < 0.05). On every marker of economic well- being, rural veterans fared worse than urban veterans. They had a statistically significant higher chance of having incomes being below 138% of FPG (20.0% versus 17.0%), of being out of the labor force (29.1% versus 23.0%), and of having no more than a high school education (39.6% versus 28.8%). Rural veterans were also more likely to experience at least one functional limitation, but they had the same chance of having a service connected disability compared to their urban counterparts.
Table II presents unadjusted estimates of health insurance type by year, overall and separately for urban and rural veter- ans. Non-elderly veterans, regardless of urban/rural status, experienced a significant 2.2 percentage point reduction in uninsurance during the first year of the ACA (from 2013 to 2014). This translated into a reduction in the number of unin- sured Veterans by approximately 230,000. Overall, coverage gains were driven by increases in employer-sponsored cover- age (0.8 percentage points) and non-VA public coverage (pri- marily Medicaid) (0.8 percentage points). There was also a significant increase in the number of veterans accessing VHA care, but there was no change in the percent of veterans who only had VHA care and no other coverage type.
The decline in the uninsured was similar for both urban and rural populations. However, the specific types of cover- age driving the reduction in uninsured differed between
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urban and rural status. Veterans in urban areas experienced a significant increase in employer-sponsored insurance of 1 percentage point and significant increase in non-VA public
coverage of 0.75 percentage points. Rural veterans did not experience a significant change in employer-sponsored insur- ance, but they did experience a significant gain in non-VA public coverage (1.23 percentage points). Rural veterans also experienced a statistically significant increase in direct pur- chase coverage while the change in direct purchase coverage for urban veterans was small and not significant.
In Figures 1 and 2, we present adjusted differences in the percent of veterans that were insured between 2013 and 2014. Complete regression results are provided in the Supplementary material. Figure 1 describes changes in the percent insured by urban/rural status, for veterans living in Medicaid expansion states versus those living in non- expansion states. Overall, veterans in Medicaid expansion states experienced a significantly larger increase in insurance compared with veterans living in non-expansion states. Rural veterans in Medicaid expansion states had significantly larger increases compared to rural veterans in non-expansion states. For rural veterans in Medicaid expansion states, the increase in insurance was 3.5 percentage points, compared with 1.2 percentage points in non-expansion states. While all urban veterans experienced a significant increase in insur- ance, the relative increase in Medicaid expansion versus non- expansion states was considerably smaller than it was for rural veterans, and it was not significant.
In Figure 2, we report adjusted differences by urban/rural and family income categories. Overall, those in the lowest- income group experienced the largest percentage point increase in insurance. For rural veterans, the lowest-income group had the largest increases followed by those in the 251–399% FPG group. The change for the 251–399% FPG group was not statistically different from the change in the 0–138% FPG group.
We conducted additional subgroup analyses and explored how sensitive our results were to various modeling approaches (see Supplementary material). For example, because the ACA targeted those without access to employer-sponsored insur- ance, we examined regression adjusted changes in insurance for low-income urban and rural veterans by employment sta- tus. Non-working urban veterans experienced a 6.8 percentage point increase in insurance and non-working rural veterans experienced an 8.4 point increase. Differences for working veterans were smaller in both urban and rural communities. We also explored how sensitive our main results were to alter- native modeling assumptions. We found that removing the states that were early adopters of the Medicaid expansion (expanding prior to January 1, 2014) had little impact on our Medicaid expansion results. We also obtained similar results when our Medicaid expansion regressions included state fixed effects. Finally, we explored how our results changed as we lowered the threshold at which we considered a veteran to reside in a predominantly rural community from 50% to 25%. Lowering the threshold had no effect on estimates of declines in uninsurance by urban and rural status, but as we reduced the threshold we found that changes to specific coverage types
TABLE I. Characteristics of Community-Dwelling Non-Elderly Urban and Rural Veterans, 2013
Urban Rural Total
% SE % SE % SE
2013 sample size 79,816 22,739 102,555 2013 population
count 8,301,388 1,800,501 10,101,889
Region Northeast 12.85 0.13 12.89 0.27 12.85 0.12 Midwest 19.31 0.18 29.79* 0.35 21.17 0.16 South 42.48 0.18 49.16* 0.38 43.67 0.17 West 25.37 0.16 8.17* 0.25 22.30 0.14
Age 18–34 16.45 0.15 12.10* 0.29 15.67 0.13 35–44 18.11 0.18 15.86* 0.30 17.71 0.15 45–64 65.45 0.20 72.04* 0.42 66.63 0.17
Gender Male 87.02 0.13 89.08* 0.24 87.39 0.13 Female 12.98 0.13 10.92* 0.24 12.61 0.13
Race White, Non-Hispanic 69.29 0.24 85.49* 0.30 72.18 0.21 Black, Non-Hispanic 16.51 0.15 8.47* 0.21 15.08 0.13 Other, Non-Hispanic 5.01 0.08 3.32* 0.15 4.71 0.08 Hispanic 9.18 0.16 2.73* 0.15 8.03 0.13
Marriage Not married 39.27 0.23 35.86* 0.45 38.66 0.19 Married 60.73 0.23 64.14* 0.45 61.34 0.19
Family income 0–138% FPG 17.02 0.16 20.00* 0.36 17.55 0.14 139–249% FPG 15.58 0.14 18.98* 0.36 16.19 0.13 250–399% FPG 21.42 0.18 24.71* 0.32 22.01 0.16 ≥400% FPG 45.98 0.23 36.32* 0.40 44.26 0.20
Educational attainment High School, GED, or less
28.88 0.20 39.59* 0.41 30.69 0.07
Some college 44.92 0.20 42.79* 0.45 44.53 0.18 Bachelor’s or more 26.32 0.19 17.62* 0.30 24.77 0.19
Employment Unemployed 5.67 0.11 4.95* 0.20 5.54 0.10 Part-timer worker 4.56 0.08 4.41 0.18 4.53 0.07 Full-time worker 66.75 0.20 61.04* 0.39 65.73 0.17 Not in labor force 23.03 0.18 29.61* 0.39 24.20 0.16
Functional limitations None 82.84 0.18 77.33* 0.38 81.86 0.16 Any 17.16 0.18 22.67* 0.38 18.14 0.16
Service connected No 78.69 0.16 78.53 0.32 78.66 0.14 Yes 21.31 0.16 21.47 0.32 21.34 0.14
Most recent period of service Vietnam era or earlier 16.56 0.14 12.58* 0.29 15.85 0.12 1975–1990 19.91 0.15 17.04* 0.35 19.40 0.13 Gulf War Era 37.04 0.21 37.11 0.40 37.05 0.18 Since 911 26.49 0.19 33.28* 0.35 27.70 0.17
Source: 2013 American Community Survey. Rural status is defined as living in a Public Use Microdata Area in which more than 50% of the population lives in a rural Census block, as defined by the Census Bureau. SE are standard errors estimated using successive dif- ference replication. *Indicates a statistically significant difference between urban and rural at the p < 0.05 level.
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TABLE II. Changes in Coverage Type for Community-Dwelling Non-Elderly Urban and Rural Vets, 2013–2014
2013 2014 Difference
% SE % SE
Total sample size 102,555 96,843 Total population size 10,101,889 9,715,012 Total Employer/tri-care coverage 70.69 0.21 71.47 0.17 0.79* Medicaid/Medicare/other public 11.73 0.11 12.57 0.14 0.83* Directly purchased coverage 7.70 0.11 7.97 0.11 0.28 VA coverage (Any) 27.22 0.20 28.17 0.18 0.95* VA coverage (Alone) 8.22 0.12 8.22 0.11 0.00 Uninsured 9.31 0.12 7.11 0.11 −2.2*
Urban Employer/tri-care coverage 71.69 0.22 72.62 0.19 0.92* Medicaid/Medicare/other public 11.01 0.12 11.76 0.15 0.75* Directly purchased coverage 7.68 0.12 7.85 0.12 0.17 VA coverage (any) 26.68 0.22 27.68 0.22 0.99* VA coverage (alone) 8.04 0.14 8.11 0.12 0.07 Uninsured 9.01 0.13 6.76 0.12 −2.25*
Rural Employer/tri-care coverage 66.06 0.40 66.18 0.44 0.12 Medicaid/Medicare/other public 15.08 0.33 16.31 0.33 1.23* Directly purchased coverage 7.77 0.23 8.53 0.24 0.76* VA coverage (any) 29.72 0.36 30.48 0.39 0.76 VA coverage (alone) 9.04 0.23 8.72 0.25 −0.33 Uninsured 10.73 0.29 8.74 0.25 −1.99*
Source: 2013–2014 American Community Survey. Rural status is defined as living in a Public Use Microdata Area in which more than 50% of the population lives in a rural Census block, as defined by the Census Bureau. Coverage types are not mutually exclusive, see text for details. SE are standard errors estimated using successive difference replication. *Indicates a statistically significant difference between 2013 and 2014 at the p < 0.05 level. Note that none of the changes over time were statistically differ- ent in rural versus urban areas.
*
*
*
*
*†
*†
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
Urban Rural Total
A d
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e rc
e n
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e P
o in
t D
if fe
re n
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s
Non-Expansion States
Medicaid Expansion
FIGURE 1. Differences in the Adjusted Percent Insured Between 2014 and 2013, by Urban/Rural and Expansion Status. Source: 2013–2014 American Community Survey. Rural status is defined as living in a Public Use Microdata Area in which more than 50% of the population lives in a rural Census Block, as defined by the Census Bureau. Results represent average marginal effects from 3 separate logistic regressions (see text for details). *Indicates a statistically significant difference between 2013 and 2014 at the p < 0.05 level. †indicates that 2014–2013 difference is signifi- cantly different in Medicaid expansion versus non-expansion states (P < 0.05). Please see the Supplementary material for complete regression results.
*
*
*
*†
†
*†
*†
*
*†
*† †
*†
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
Urban Rural Total
A d
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e rc
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e P
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t D
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0–138% FPG 139–250% FPG 251–399% FPG ≥ 400% FPG
FIGURE 2. Differences in the Adjusted Percent Insured Between 2014 and 2013, by Urban/Rural and Income. Source: 2013–2014 American Community Survey. Rural status is defined as living in a Public Use Microdata Area in which more than 50% of the population lives in a rural Census Block, as defined by the Census Bureau. Results represent average marginal effects from three separate logistic regressions (see text for details). *Indicates a statistically significant difference between 2013 and 2014 at the p < 0.05 level. †Indicates that 2014–2013 difference is significantly different in the given income category compared to the lowest-income group (P < 0.05). Please see the Supplementary material for complete regression results.
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tended to appear similar across rural and urban areas. This did not surprise us, as lowering the threshold had the effect of increasing the “urban-ness” of those PUMAs we initially clas- sified as predominantly rural.
CONCLUSION There was a significant increase in insurance for U.S. veter- ans during the first year of the ACA. Our results suggest a substantial 24% relative decline in uninsurance from 2013 to 2014 – from a 9.3% uninsured rate to 7.1%. The changes in insurance status we observed were similar for both urban and rural veterans, but coverage gains by rural/urban status were driven by different coverage pathways. In urban areas, the increase in coverage was driven in large part by gains in employer-sponsored insurance that was likely the result of an improving economy and not the direct effect of the ACA. In rural areas, the increase in coverage was largely due to gains in Medicaid and individual market coverage. Residence in a Medicaid expansion state was particularly influential for rural veterans – the decline in the uninsured rate was three times larger in Medicaid expansion states versus non-expansion states.
Our analysis suggests that Medicaid expansion was asso- ciated with a significant increase in health insurance cover- age rates for rural veterans; we did not find a similar association for urban veterans. Rural veterans had neither gains nor losses in employer-sponsored insurance.
Relatedly, we found that rural veterans were more likely to be out of the labor force compared to urban veterans and thus Medicaid may have played an important role in buffer- ing the negative impact of a weak labor market.
Two-thirds of non-elderly U.S. veterans were either Gulf War veterans or in service since 9/11, between the ages of 45 and 64, and working full time. Not surprisingly, most veterans (71.5% in 2014) obtained their health insurance through their or a spouse’s place of employment, higher than the rate for the non-elderly with employer-sponsored insur- ance for the general U.S. population (56%).21 Yet for low- income veterans including those without jobs or employer- sponsored insurance, the ACA has provided new pathways for obtaining health insurance coverage which have supple- ments services and financing provided through the VHA. We found that the Medicaid expansion was a particular important source of coverage for rural veterans. A concern at this point is for the many (43.7%) veterans living in the south where 10 out of 19 states (as of 2016) that have not expanded Medicaid22 are located.23
U.S. veterans rely on both public and private health insur- ance coverage in addition to VHA coverage. As policy- makers and VA administrators continue to seek and experiment with new policy alternatives for increasing access to health services for veterans, the new coverage options created by the ACA will be an important tool.
Perhaps more importantly, states that have not yet expanded Medicaid should consider the impact that expansion would have on increased coverage and access to care for low- income veterans and particularly those residing in rural areas.
SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL Supplementary material is available at Military Medicine online.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This study was funded in part under a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to the State Health Access Data Assistance Center at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health.
FUNDING This study was funded in part under a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to the State Health Access Data Assistance Center at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health.
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