Heavier Lifting On Medicaid Overhaul Begins

We’ve reported widely on Gov. Mike Beebe’s (D) efforts to overhaul the state’s Medicaid system, which he’s warned will face a fiscal crisis by July 2012.

Beebe is pushing the state’s medical community to consider "episode bundling" payments for Medicaid reimbursements in an effort to save money. The effort has been met with resistance from health care providers, although work continues.

John Lyon with our content partner, the Arkansas News Bureau, dropped in on the first working group meeting held at UAMS on Monday. He reports:

More than 50 people participated in the first meeting of the work group on pregnancy and neonatal intensive care at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock. Eight other work groups will meet in the coming weeks to begin discussing other areas of health care that state officials are targeting.

“We have a bit of a dilemma in the health care system, not just in this state but in the nation, in that … what we do in health care is beginning to outstrip our ability to generate funds to cover it,” Dr. William Golden, director of medical policy for the state Medicaid system and a professor of public health at UAMS, told the group at the start of today’s meeting.

“The governor decided as he started his second and last term in office that he would like to see Medicaid and potentially all of Arkansas try something different and move ahead to paying for outcomes in value rather than paying for each service that we deliver,” Golden said.

Scheduled to meet next is a work group on cardiovascular care, which will meet Oct. 26. at UAMS. A work group on developmental disabilities is scheduled to meet Nov. 1 at the teaching hospital.

Others areas state officials are targeting include attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, type 2 diabetes, back pain, upper respiratory infections, long-term care and prevention.

You can read more from Lyon’s article at this link.