Briefs Provide Updated Data About People Who are Dually Eligible For Medicare and Medicaid
Kaiser Family Foundation April 4, 2012
About 9 million low-income seniors and younger people with disabilities in the United States are covered by both Medicare and Medicaid. For these beneficiaries, Medicare is the primary source of health insurance, and Medicaid provides supplemental coverage, helping with premiums, cost-sharing and paying for services not covered by Medicare. With complex and often costly health-care needs, dual-eligible beneficiaries are the focus of many policy proposals that aim to improve the coordination of their care in order to both raise its quality and lower spending.
Two newly updated Kaiser Family Foundation briefs provide an in-depth look at these dual-eligible beneficiaries and the role that each program plays in financing their care.
Medicare’s Role for Dual-Eligible Beneficiaries, http://www.kff.org/medicare/8138.cfm, examines overall and per-capita Medicare spending for these beneficiaries, including variations reflecting their diverse circumstances. It describes the characteristics of those with the relatively high and low Medicare costs and includes state-specific data on the share of Medicare beneficiaries who are dual-eligibles.
Medicaid’s Role for Dual-Eligible Beneficiaries, http://www.kff.org/medicaid/7846.cfm, explains the role Medicaid plays in filling in the gaps in Medicare’s coverage for dual-eligible beneficiaries. It explains how Medicare beneficiaries become eligible for Medicaid, provides national and state-by-state data on enrollment, and examines national and state-specific data on Medicaid spending for dual-eligibles by service and eligibility group.
The Foundation also has a broader collection of resources on dual-eligible beneficiaries, including not only basic facts and data, but also analysis and explanation of specific issues, including provisions of health reform affecting dual-eligible beneficiaries; issues affecting people with disabilities, those with multiple chronic conditions, and those with long-term care needs; and efforts to use managed care to serve this population.
These resources are available online at http://www.kff.org/medicare/resources-dual-eligibles.cfm.