In a letter to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), America’s Essential Hospitals commented on the proposed changes to benefit and payment parameters for federal health care marketplaces and state-based marketplaces on the federal platform.
The association expressed support for the agency’s efforts to expand access to care and make the enrollment process easier and more understandable. This will benefit essential hospital patients and other consumers enrolling in marketplace coverage.
America’s Essential Hospitals calls on CMS to ensure equitable access to qualified health plan beneficiaries’ preferred health care providers through essential community provider threshold requirements and network adequacy standards. This would limit disruption of patient-provider relationships when insurance coverage changes between Medicaid and marketplace coverage. The letter also urges CMS to mandate that all marketplaces implement the new expanded special enrollment period for loss of Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) coverage.
Contact Senior Director of Policy Erin O’Malley at eomalley@essentialhospitals.org or 202.585.0127 with questions.
