Federal Health Care Reform

On March 21st, the House of Representatives voted to pass Health Care Reform. On March 23rd, President Obama signed this historic bill into law. CHCs are at the forefront of this shift in health care with the establishment of an $11 billion Trust Fund for Community Health Center growth over 5 years. Additionally, to address the critical shortage of health care providers, the National Health Services Corps will receive $1.5 billion over 5 years (See estimated growth projection below).

  • Some other significant provisions in health reform that impact community health centers are:
  • Medicaid expansion to 133% FPL in 2014
  •  Starting in 2014, requirement that health centers receive no less than their Medicaid PPS rate from private insurers offering plans through the new health insurance exchanges will go into effect.
  •  The elimination of the outdated Medicare payment cap
  •  Acknowledgement of the growing role of health centers in teaching the next generation of primary care providers by authorizing and funding new programs for health center-based residencies.
  •  Medical Home Demonstration Projects
  •  Permanent CHC Reauthorization

 

Tracking Health Care Reform (Matrix)

OPCA has developed a federal health care reform matrix. It’s a tool to track the opportunities and impacts of federal health reform that relate to community health centers.

This matrix is a work in progress. It is as complete as OPCA has been able to make it so far, but we know there is more to add. We’d like your help in co-creating a tool that will help us all stay on top of a huge – and hugely important - piece of legislation.

So please use and improve the matrix. We’ve set up a wiki-like process to harness all the brainpower we can to keep it up-to-date and accurate.

Find the Most Recent Version of the Tool Here

Find the Process Description and Instructions for Updating the Tool Here

 

Additional Resources 

Affordable Care Act
http://democrats.senate.gov/reform/patient-protection-affordable-care-act-as-passed.pdf

Reconciliation Bill
http://docs.house.gov/rules/hr4872/111_hr4872_amndsub.pdf

NACHC
http://www.nachc.com/healthreform.cfm

Kaiser Family Foundation
http://www.kff.org/healthreform/upload/8061.pdf