State News

Maine’s largest healthcare system, MaineHealth, received a $12.8 million dollar grant from the National Institutes of Health to study ways to reduce disparities in quality of care between rural and urban areas, reports the Portland Press Herald. The grant will be used to fund several studies, including research on the use of telehealth and rural health outcomes, that aim to reduce rural health disparities in acute care settings. The funds will be used to develop a statewide network to address barriers in rural health, such as limited resources, access and expertise.

Health Current, Arizona’s statewide health information exchange, announced the implementation of a new “closed loop” referral platform to help users gain a greater understanding of social determinants of health (SDOH) and enhance data exchange, according to EHR Intelligence. The system aims to streamline the SDOH screening and referral process by better connecting healthcare and community service providers, increasing access to social services and verifying that recommended social services were received. The effort closely aligns with the Arizona Medicaid program’s Whole Person Care Initiative, which focuses on SDOH such as housing, employment, criminal justice, transportation and home and community-based services interventions.

The Oregon Health Authority has officially launched the Community Benefit Minimum Spending Floor program—a regulatory system intended to ensure that Oregon’s nonprofit hospitals don’t cut their spending on charity care, according to The Lund Report. Other states, especially those that expanded Medicaid, have taken similar steps to ensure that nonprofit hospital systems devote an adequate portion of their spending to community-benefit programs. The Oregon Health Authority’s definition of community benefit not only includes charity care to uninsured or indigent people, but also community health programs, employee education, certain kinds of research and the difference between what a hospital says it costs to care for a Medicaid-covered patient and the amount that the state pays as reimbursement.

Both primary healthcare need and demand in D.C. increased from 2015 to 2018, with Black and Latino populations experiencing greater need and demand than white and Asian populations, according to a report from the D.C. Policy Center. Healthcare need is measured as the number of annual primary care visits an individual is predicted to have based on their age, sex, and health status, and healthcare demand is the predicted number of annual primary care visits while accounting for barriers, such as cost, education and language. The report notes that there are higher shares of elderly residents among Black Washingtonians and higher shares of children among Latino Washingtonians—age groups that typically need more primary care visits. However, the report also finds that there is a larger gap between healthcare need and demand. Barriers to healthcare—including language, cost and education—are likely to be higher for Black and Latino populations. The authors suggest that the greater amount of primary healthcare need among Black and Latino populations could be a factor causing the inequitable COVID-19 outcomes that these groups are experiencing.

Mayor Bowser declared gun violence to be a public health emergency in the city and announced a new “whole-government” approach to address it, reports The Washington Post. The District of Columbia has seen an increase in gun-related homicides, which disproportionately affects Black men—one of the many health inequities that Black people in D.C. experience. The city is establishing a “gun violence prevention emergency operations center” that will be staffed with people from education, job training, mental health counseling and housing fields. The Center aims to address root causes of gun violence, such as poverty, lack of education, and poor physical and mental healthcare, among other upstream factors of health.

Minnesota adults face high levels of healthcare affordability burdens, reports AboutHealthTransparency.org. A survey of more than 1,070 Minnesota adults, conducted by Altarum's Healthcare Value Hub from Oct. 30, 2020 to Nov. 27, 2020, found that more than half (51%) experienced healthcare affordability burdens in the past year. In addition, even more are worried about affording healthcare in the future and high numbers are worried about becoming ill from the coronavirus. The survey also revealed regional differences in how Minnesota adults experience healthcare affordability burdens. Fifty-seven percent of residents in the Southern region face these burdens, the highest in the state, and 51% of Southern region adults reported skipping a recommended medical test or treatment due to cost. Forty-one percent of Twin Cities Metro area residents, by comparison, reported doing the same. 

In response to inequitable vaccine rollout in New Jersey, state officials have created a ‘vulnerable populations plan,’ which calls for partnerships with community centers and places of worship to create vaccine clinics focused on specific communities, reports NJ Spotlight News. These partnerships are expected to bring dedicated vaccines to racially diverse and vulnerable communities hardest hit by the pandemic. The partnerships will operate temporarily, with each seeking to vaccinate some 3,000 people over two weeks and then reopening several weeks later to provide second doses of the vaccine.

The Maryland House of Delegates has overridden the Governor’s 2020 veto of a Prescription Drug Affordability Board, enabling plans for the Board to proceed, reports STAT+. In January, the Senate also overrode the veto, which the Governor had issued over concerns that the move would raise taxes and fees at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic had already hurt citizens. The Board is designed to function like rate-setting boards that regulate what public utilities can charge residents, with supporters arguing that the board can save consumers money by lowering prescription drug costs. What sets the PDAB apart from other state efforts to rein in costs is that it can, if determined to be in the best interest of the state, make a recommendation to the Maryland General Assembly to pursue upper payment limits to make drugs affordable. If the Board makes this determination, it will first develop a plan of action for review and approval by the Legislative Policy Committee. Maine has also enacted a law creating a board. Although rather than setting upper payment limits for medicines, the board established a spending target for public payers and seeks to leverage public purchasing power to meet its target.

Half of Pennsylvania residents struggled with healthcare costs in the past year and nearly two thirds were worried about affording healthcare in the future, reports The Philadelphia Inquirer. In addition, Altarum Healthcare Value Hub’s 2020 Consumer Healthcare Experience State Survey (CHESS) found that to reduce healthcare costs, 20 percent of Pennsylvania adults skipped going to the doctor, a procedure or a recommended test and 22 percent skipped medication doses, cut pills in half or avoided filling a prescription. The COVID-19 pandemic has only exacerbated concerns about healthcare costs, with 60 percent of Pennsylvania residents worried about being able to afford COVID-19 treatment if they need it