GARY, Ind. — Reginald Rogers owes his dentist a debt of gratitude for his new dentures, but no money.
Rogers is among the more than 240,000 low-income residents who gained health coverage in the past year when Indiana expanded Medicaid as part of the Affordable Care Act. Rogers pays $1 a month — a fee that is a hallmark of the state’s controversial plan.
Healthy Indiana pushes Medicaid’s traditional boundaries, which is why it has the attention of other conservative states. The plan demands something from all enrollees, even those below the poverty line. The poorest Hoosiers can get coverage with vision and dental benefits, but only if they make small monthly contributions to accounts similar to health savings accounts.
Individuals who fail to keep up lose the enhanced coverage and face co-payments. Others who are above the poverty line can temporarily lose all coverage if they fall behind on contributions. If that sounds more like commercial insurance, it’s by design. So is the plan’s tough-minded approach to paying for low-income Americans’ health care.
Yet Healthy Indiana remains a singular experiment with an uncertain outcome. Detractors worry that its complexity could make health care harder for the poor to access — the opposite of a core goal of expansion. There is no proof that the state is saving money or that its approach is making participants healthier.
“Other states have looked at it, but the Obama administration has made it pretty clear that Indiana is going to be a test case and much evaluation will need to be done before they approve any more like it,” said Matt Salo, executive director of the National Association of Medicaid Directors. No other program has been allowed to require health spending accounts, much less threaten to yank coverage for a person not paying in, he noted.
Since Indiana’s expansion began in February 2015, more than 235,000 previously uninsured, able-bodied adults have signed up. As of late February, the plan covered more than 370,000 people total, many with extremely low incomes. Another 190,000 adults are eligible but not enrolled, according to state estimates, although some who are above the poverty line may be in subsidized private plans.
Michelle Stoughton, senior director of government relations for Anthem, says the response represents success. Anthem is one of three private insurers providing coverage under Healthy Indiana. “What we heard for years . . . is that these people won’t pay and don’t have the ability to pay,” Stoughton said. “But this has turned those arguments around and been able to show that people do want to be engaged.”
The ACA created the financial means and the opportunity for Healthy Indiana. The 2010 law paid for states to expand Medicaid by enrolling all adults under 65 who earned up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level — about $16,394 annually for an individual. The federal government will have absorbed the full cost of newly eligible beneficiaries from 2014 through this year. After that, its share falls gradually to 90 percent in 2020 and beyond.
As did most GOP-controlled states, Indiana initially balked at the offer, with officials citing concerns about Medicaid’s costs and effectiveness. Now, they believe they’ve found the solution. Republican Gov. Mike Pence sees the plan as a model for others.
Healthy Indiana “has established a new health-care paradigm in Indiana, rooted in consumerism and personal responsibility,” Pence said in late January as he marked the plan’s first anniversary.
With Healthy Indiana, enrollees can choose basic coverage that requires no monthly fee but excludes dental and vision. Or they can pay the monthly fee for enhanced coverage with those benefits.
Their contributions go into what is called a POWER account — the acronym stands for Personal Wellness and Responsibility — that is used for the first $2,500 of medical expenses each year. Indiana pays the bulk of that and if expenses exceed $2,500, the state also pays for additional services at no cost to the individual.
The optional dental and vision coverage, which many states don’t offer to adults on Medicaid, is proving to be a powerful lure. Nearly 75 percent of Anthem’s Healthy Indiana members visited a dentist, and 65 percent sought vision care in the first three months of coverage, Stoughton said.
Members who don’t maintain their monthly contributions are penalized, but the punishment is tied to their income level. A person above the poverty level — $11,880 in annual income — can be unenrolled for six months from all coverage. Someone below that level who stops paying will lose the dental and vision coverage and face co-pay charges of up to $8 to see a doctor or fill a prescription. According to state figures, about half of program enrollees have annual incomes below $600.
The hook may be working. Overall, 94 percent of people with POWER accounts have continued to pay into them, officials said. Most do so through debit cards, money orders or a free payment service at local Walmart stores.
Still, about 2,200 people with incomes above poverty have lost coverage since May because they didn’t pay their monthly fees.
Hospitals and doctors supported the Healthy Indiana plan because both got substantial raises from Medicaid. Indiana agreed to increase hospitals’ rates by an average 20 percent and doctors’ pay by an average of 25 percent. As a result, Medicaid has gained more than 5,300 providers in the past year, and patients report few problems getting care.
What is not clear is whether Healthy Indiana is paying off for the state and worth modeling in others. Some conservative groups say the program may be more expensive than traditional Medicaid, because it provides dental and vision care and better compensates providers.
“I’m not against expanding coverage, but people should know it comes at a cost,” said Josh Archambault, a senior fellow for the conservative Foundation for Government Accountability.
Other critics raise concerns that the monthly payments and the more complicated structure of people’s coverage will keep the poor from getting care.
Joan Alker, executive director of the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families, said the red tape in Healthy Indiana exceeds that of any state’s Medicaid expansion. Few third parties, such as employers and nonprofit groups, have offered to help individuals cover their monthly contributions, as the state had hoped, Alker noted.
She questions why so few eligible people above the poverty level have not enrolled. Many may have signed up for subsidized ACA marketplace plans in 2014 and could now be paying more than necessary, she said.
“It’s premature for Indiana to take a victory lap,” Alker said.
Kaiser Health News is a national health policy news service that is part of the nonpartisan Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.
