Gene Lewit,
The David and Lucile Packard Foundation
Living in Silicon Valley, I am used to reading about new
tech wonders every day. In fact, today, we use the internet to do many things
we used to do in person, by snailmail or on the telephone. This trend is
encouraged by new technology, but has gained popularity because it is often
less expensive and more convenient than traditional methods. So, it’s not
surprising that states are increasingly using the internet to enroll, and
sometimes re-enroll, children and families in their Medicaid and Children’s
Health Insurance Programs (CHIP).
A recent survey by the
Kaiser Family Foundation and Georgetown University’s Center for Children and
Families found that as of January 2012, 34 Medicaid programs and 30 separate
CHIP programs allow for electronically- submitted applications for children and
sometimes their parents as well.
California, the home of Silicon Valley, started providing
a public access online application option, known as Healthy-e-Application
Public Access (HeA PA), for its Medicaid (MediCal) and CHIP (Healthy Families)
programs for children and pregnant women in December 2010. Previously, families
could only apply for these programs using a paper application or with the help
of application assistors and county employees who had exclusive access to HeA
and/or One-e-App, an electronic application for a variety of public benefit
programs. The positive change HeA PA has made in families’ ability to enroll
their eligible children in MediCal and Healthy Families is reported in
Healthy-E-Application Public Access:
A New Online Path to Children’s Health Care Coverage in California, An
Overview of the First Year,
released on March 5th by Mathematica Policy Research. This report is the first in a series of reports that will
examine the impact, functionality and user experience associated with the new
online enrollment route. The work
is supported by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and the California
HealthCare Foundation in partnership with California’s Managed Risk Medical
Insurance Board.
The current report provides some encouraging information
about the potential impact of HeA PA and other online application tools. One
piece of good news is that the use of HeA PA was associated with a 14% increase
in total applications submitted to the state processing center from 2010 to
2011. About a quarter of HeA PA
applications were submitted outside of regular business hours, which suggests
convenience is important in the application process and the use of HeA PA. HeA
PA applications were also more likely to be complete, including required
documentation, than paper applications but less likely to be complete than
assisted online applications.
But the report also raises a number of questions and
caveats to be considered as we look for technological solutions to the
challenges we face enrolling children and their families in these programs. For
example, more than 4,000 HeA PA applications were submitted in the first full
month it was available, but before there was an active outreach campaign. This
is especially surprising since HeA PA was released at the end of 2010 during
the holidays, with very little fanfare. However, the number of HeA PA
applications remained at around the same level for the rest of the year,
despite an outreach campaign launched in July. These findings suggest that
while there may be a demand for online public access applications, that demand
may be limited.
Another interesting finding is the large variation in the
use of HeA PA by county. The share of applications accounted for by HeA PA by
county ranged from 0 to 48 percent and both heavily-populated urban and
sparsely populated rural counties were present at both ends of the range. We
need more research to better understand this variation and what it means for
the impact HeA PA and other online application systems might have.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA)
calls for states to have enrollment portal systems that provide a high-quality
customer experience, reach a high degree of online use, and maximize self
service for people applying for health insurance coverage through Medicaid,
CHIP or a health insurance exchange. We can learn a lot from the experience of
the first year of HeA PA as California, along with other states, strive to
implement the consumer-friendly online experience the ACA envisions. The HeA PA data, and common sense,
caution however that we will continue to need to accommodate people who prefer
paper applications and/or personal assistance.