Medicaid Patients and Access to Care

Subsidized health centers welcome surge of Medicaid patients, By Kathleen O’Brien, February 16, 2015, Star-Ledger: “What comes to mind when you hear the term ‘clinic’? A storefront in the low-rent side of town, with plastic chairs in a crowded waiting room? A cramped examination room with just a curtain for privacy, where worried relatives hover in the hallway? That’s exactly what the old ‘Dover Community Clinic’ looked like a quarter-century ago when it was founded by a newly retired urologist who wanted to treat the poor. Now the Zufall Health Center occupies a renovated bank smack in the center of town, its three-story stone façade conveying solidity and permanence. It has a fancy new name – a Federally Qualified Health Center – and ‘clinic’ is a word consigned to its past…”
Medicaid patients struggle to get dental care, By Phil Galewitz, February 15, 2015, USA Today: “When Pavel Poliakov’s clothing shop in this picturesque college town closed last year, he felt lucky to be able to sign up for Medicaid just as Colorado expanded the program under President Obama’s health law. But when Poliakov developed such a severe toothache that he couldn’t eat on one side of his mouth, he was unable to find a dentist -— even though Colorado had just extended dental benefits to adults on Medicaid. Eventually, he turned to a county taxpayer-supported clinic that holds a monthly lottery for new patients…”