NUR-550 Topic 7 Discussion 2: Select an effective current health policy that focuses on or affects population health.
NUR-550 Topic 7 Discussion 2: Select an effective current health policy that focuses on or affects population health.
Topic 7 DQ 2
Assessment Description
Select an effective current health policy that focuses on or affects population health. What components of this policy make it effective? Conduct research on its history and the factors that influenced its development.
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Affordable Care Act
Successful implementation of legislation and health policies have significant implications on access to healthcare and population health. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is one of the most effective health policies in the United States. The directives of this law are mandated to expand health insurance coverage through the expansion of Medicaid eligibility in all states, modification of Medicaid eligibility to include persons with low income and with no dependents, enforcing tax penalties on individuals who don’t secure health insurance, and extension of parental coverage to children and young adults below 26 years (Brown et al., 2021). These measures contribute to reducing health disparities in access to care attributed to various vulnerability factors such as socioeconomic status.
The Affordable Care Act purposed to make healthcare more accessible, affordable, and quality. The key components of this policy are affordable care and patient protection, each with fundamental frameworks for achieving the set goals. Affordable care is achieved through the integration of sliding-scale premium subsidies, cost-sharing subsidies, and rate restrictions to expand Medicaid and stabilize insurance marketplaces (Campbell et al., 2021). The patient protection component provided guidelines to enhance healthcare access and coverage through the guaranteed issue, protection of individuals with preexisting conditions, no annual or lifetime caps on expenditures for covered services, essential health benefits coverage, and free preventive care services ( Campbell et al. 2021). Additional measures were mandated to promote community-based services to further address healthcare needs, especially among the vulnerable population.
The implementation of the Affordable Care Act was a major milestone towards achieving universal health care and access to primary health care. This policy was passed into law in 2010 with the expansion of healthcare coverage taking effect in 2014 (Crowley et al., 2019). The development of this policy was driven by healthcare issues affecting the general population, especially barriers to equitable access to healthcare. These included limited access to preventive and treatment services by uninsured or underinsured individuals, low-income earners, ethnic minorities, and catastrophic out-of-pocket payments for healthcare services (Crowley et al., 2019). The experienced benefits include improved access and quality of healthcare and reduced healthcare cost and spending.
References
Brown, E. A., White, B. M., Jones, W. J., Gebregziabher, M., & Simpson, K. N. (2021). Correction to: Measuring the impact of the affordable care act Medicaid expansion on access to primary care using an interrupted time series approach. Health Research Policy and Systems, 19(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12961-021-00740-y
Campbell, & Shore-Sheppard. (2020). The social, political, and economic effects of the affordable care act: Introduction to the issue. RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences, 6(2), 1. https://doi.org/10.7758/rsf.2020.6.2.01
Crowley, R. A., & Bornstein, S. S. (2019). Improving the patient protection and affordable care act’s insurance coverage provisions: A position paper from the American College of Physicians. Annals of Internal Medicine, 170(9), 651. https://doi.org/10.7326/m18-3401