Health & Healthcare in America: From Economics to Policy

June 22 - 25, 2014

Provider Response to Medicare and Medicaid Policy

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) will expand public coverage and change reimbursement rates for services rendered to publicly-insured patients. Many have expressed concern that these dramatic changes will affect the type and quality of care that current patients receive, for example, by increasing wait times. This session features two papers that explore providers’ ability to respond to the increase in demand associated with public health insurance coverage expansions. The third paper investigates how providers change their treatment patterns when payments change.