HCA-DQ2-Reply
JS79
SSHW-HCA-M2-Reply.docxPlease reply to Vickie Dawson – Please note minimum of 200 words. No sources citation needed.
Affordable Care Act (ACA).
Although the affordable care act was designed and implemented to address the high uninsured rates among low income populations and to provide a coverage option with low access to employer coverage (Nickitas, Middough & Aries, 2011), there some components of this act that could potentially impact specific populations negatively. First, the low income families may continue to experience reduced access to healthcare services. Typically, upon being enrolled under the ACA, most people are likely to seek medical services twice than they would without the insurance. In this context, ACA increases the demand for healthcare services, while not channeling equal efforts in the supply of these services.
When healthcare professionals chose to offer concierge care, they are most likely to give a few clients better access to medical services while leaving a large number to fend for themselves. With the pressure on healthcare providers to maintain the cost of care as low as possible, most of them will see patients in insurance plans below the minimum last. Unfortunately, patients under health insurance plans that pay below the market often come from vulnerable populations such as low income families, thus further limiting their access to healthcare services (Garfield et al., 2016). Besides, a study of the impact of the ACA shows the possibility of this act to impose a burden on the vulnerable populations by stretching out the possibility of increased unfunded liabilities that could lead to an increase of health related costs. For these two reasons, the ACA should be revised to avoid the potential unjust impact it might have on these vulnerable populations.
Nonetheless, the ACA has undeniably made healthcare more affordable in the last decade, which has translated to better access to healthcare services. The rate at which individuals skip certain procedures and treatments due to high costs has significantly reduced, which shows how the ACA has encouraged more people to seek medical care that is affordable (Seo et al., 2019). Apart from that, ACA has to a great extent helped to protect patients with preexisting conditions from discrimination. Prior to the enactment of the ACA, patients with preexisting conditions and complicated medical history faced discrimination by insurance providers. As such, the ACA should be kept, and only revised to amend the potential risk areas.
References
Garfield, R., Damico, A., Stephens, J., & Rouhani, S. (2016). The coverage gap: uninsured poor adults in states that do not expand Medicaid–an update. Menlo Park, CA: Kaiser Family Foundation.
Nickitas, D. M., Middough, D. J., & Aries, N. (2011). Public policy and politics for nurses and other healthcare professionals: Advocacy and action. Journal of Nursing Regulation, 2(1), 64. https://doi.org/10.1016/s2155-8256(15)30305-7
Seo, V., Baggett, T. P., Thorndike, A. N., Hull, P., Hsu, J., Newhouse, J. P., & Fung, V. (2019). Access to care among Medicaid and uninsured patients in community health centers after the Affordable Care Act. BMC Health Services Research, 19(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-019-4124-z
Please reply to Sandy Vang – Please note minimum of 200 words. No sources citation
In March 2010, the President of United States, Barack Obama signed a comprehensive health reform called the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act into law (Courtemanche et . al., 2018) with the intent to make health insurance readily and more affordable for everyone all while trying to control the cost of healthcare and provide other health incentives. In 2017, President Trump attempted to repeal the Affordable Care Act, instead Congress was able to eliminate the tax penalty for individuals who did not obtain health insurance.
Prior to the Affordable Care Act, I had insurance. At seventeen years old, I obtained my first job and was only able to physically work once I turned eighteen. With that said I had always had health insurance through my employer and was relatively healthy to where I saw my medical providers once a year for checkups. When the Affordable Care Act was introduced, I did not see that the big issues surrounding the new law were. However, I do believe we should continue to keep the Affordable Care Act because it allows for individuals to stay on their legal guardian’s health plan up to twenty six years of age instead of the previous age limitation of nineteen years of age (Zhao et al., 2020). Another reason Affordable Care Act should be kept as it is, is the fact that it does not discriminate on medical conditions. Individuals will be accepted into a health plan with the knowledge of any pre existing health conditions (Zhao et al., 2020). I feel this is especially important for pediatric oncology patients who aged out of their parents’ health plan or for adults who had childhood cancer.
With all the positive benefits of the Affordable Care Act, it can also have a negative aspect were a revision should be considered. Currently, some insurance companies have minimized their available providers list and types of health specialty it covers. For example there are “in network” and “out of network” providers. Personally speaking, my insurance will only cover in network providers, if I needed treatment from an out of network, my provider will give me a referral and I am financially responsible to cover more for a treatment that would be cheaper with an in network provider. The law should be revised to have more incentives to have more providers in network. Additionally, the Affordable Care Act should be revised because is not as “affordable” as it said it be. This care act only benefits the younger population were as individual who are older or are retired have higher premiums and overall high deductibles that they cannot afford on a set income (Foster & Murray, 2021).
Courtemanche, C., Marton, J., Ukert, B., Yelowitz, A., Zapata, D., & Fazlul, I. (2018). The three-year impact of the Affordable Care Act on disparities in insurance coverage. Health Services Research, 54(S1), 307–316. https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-6773.13077
Foster, H., & Murray, M. (2021). A sensible solution: How the affordable care act can insure more young Invincibles. Forefront Group. https://doi.org/10.1377/forefront.20210604.467869
Zhao, J., Mao, Z., Fedewa, S. A., Nogueira, L., Yabroff, K. R., Jemal, A., & Han, X. (2020). The Affordable Care Act and access to care across the cancer control continuum: A review at 10 Years. CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, 70(3), 165–181. https://doi.org/10.3322/caac.21604
