This WRAL article discusses how people newly acquiring health insurance are having trouble finding a doctor. The reason is that there is already a shortage of primary care physicians, and these newly-insured people are finding it difficult to find doctors accepting new patients. According to the article:
A survey this year by The Physicians Foundation found that 81 percent of doctors describe themselves as either over-extended or at full capacity, and 44 percent said they planned to cut back on the number of patients they see, retire, work part-time or close their practice to new patients.…..
“Coverage does not equal access,” said (insurance agent Anthony) Halby, who instead recommends his clients choose a plan outside the exchange that has a much broader provider network but also will not come with the government premium subsidies given to most of those who buy insurance through the exchange.
The article focuses on people signing up for insurance on Obamacare exchanges, but the sentiment can be expressed even more aptly when it comes to Medicaid expansion.
One question advocates of Medicaid expansion never want to confront is: will the new Medicaid enrollees even have access to a doctor? There is already a physician shortage nationally, and in NC. Some reports show that only 15 states have fewer physicians per capita than does NC. The problem is especially acute in rural areas, where the concentration of Medicaid enrollees is even heavier to match even lower doctor to population ratios.
North Carolina’s Medicaid program has added more than 600,000 people in the last dozen years. At the same time, the number of NC physicians treating Medicaid patients has fallen.
Expansion, by some estimates, would add another 400,000 to 500,000 to the Medicaid rolls. That would mean a million new Medicaid enrollees since 2001 – chasing fewer doctors. And of those who do accept Medicaid patients, one-fourth of them are not accepting new Medicaid patients.
This is not politics or ideology – this is simple math. Medicaid expansion in NC would not provide access to medical care to the new enrollees, it would simply give them a Medicaid card with little to no hope of actually seeing a doctor when they are sick.
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