Health Insurance Reform Research Paper

President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act on March 23, 2010. This law puts in place widespread health insurance reforms that expanded out over the last 4 years and continues to change the lives of many Americans today. Health care reform has been an extensively debated topic for multiple years, and the ACA is the first effective attempt at passing a law aiming to make health care not only affordable, but accessible for all individuals. The law impacts many Americans including, children, employers, government programs which includes federal and state, health plans and private insurers, health care coverage, health care cost, and the quality of care received. The main goal of the law is to expand health care coverage, broaden Medicaid eligibility, minimize and regulate health care cost, and improve the health care delivery system. In order to improve the health care delivery there have been new consumer protections established and an increase access to affordable care.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) has been a topic of dispute since its introduction and continues to be discussed by politicians in the U.S. and throughout the world even after its passage. The Act has many opponents and is the cause of much controversy nationwide, primarily because it introduces higher healthcare costs for the richest citizens. Nevertheless, the ACA is an important stage in the American healthcare development process as it not only allows more people to receive healthcare services, but will also reduce the deficit. However, not everyone agrees. The policy is controversial in terms of cost vs. benefits, but the benefits ultimately outweigh the costs.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) is considered to be one of the most radical health care moves in legislation after Medicare. The reason being that it will provide universal health coverage to everyone regardless of circumstance. An evaluation of ACA’s influence on health care will be evaluated in this paper.

The Affordable Care Act, in its time, has helped many uninsured Americans to obtain health insurance by giving them guaranteed coverage. About 20 million Americans, based on the statistics from the New York Times’s article titled “Fact Check: Trump’s Critiques of the Affordable Care Act.”, have obtained health insurance through the ACA. Dropping the uninsured rate to 11 percent by 2013 (Qiu 2017). Americans, through the ACA, were able to get health insurance even if they got sick, which inevitably happens to many. This put insurers in a place where they cannot deny coverage to people who have preexisting conditions, or their health history. Other main points that are included in Former President Obama’s Affordable Care Act is that one, it was given as an individual mandate that all U.S. Citizens and legal residents must enroll for qualifying health care or get penalized for not signing up for insurance at all. Making the fact that getting health care is mandatory is a good way to lower the insured rates and save many Americans money when the next unexpected hospital visits or illnesses come up. Another thing is that the ACA has also expanded medicaid to all non-Medicaid eligible individuals that are under the age 65 and making medicaid more federal funded based rather than a state issue. Thus helping those who could not afford

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) extended healthcare coverage to millions of formerly uninsured individuals by expanding eligibility of Medicaid and the formation of Health Insurance Marketplaces. The ACA also included reforms to assist individuals sustain coverage and have the availability of affordable and accessible private healthcare insurance. Analysis from 2014 and early 2015 and have shown significant increases in public and private healthcare insurance coverage and have attributed the remarkable decreases of the rates of uninsured individuals from marketplace.gov and health insurance exchanges from the first year the ACA had healthcare coverage available.

The Health Care Reform Act is also known as the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law by President Barrack Obama on March 23, 2010, (Touhy & Jett, 2014, p. 111). Its goals are to expand coverage, control health care costs, and improve the health care delivery system. It focuses on health promotion and greater emphasis on preventive care. The new legislation allows people and small businesses to purchase health insurance coverage through the health insurance market places—a virtual insurance mega mall where private insurers compete for business. The market exchange ensures that insures follow strict guidelines and compete fairly allowing people the opportunity to compare plans that best suits their needs.

The ACA was introduced to care for those without insurance, and to also make amends to those with a pre-existing condition to retain some semblance of health insurance. When fully implemented, the ACA promises to lead to a dramatically different health care process for the United States in the years to come. The central legislation to making this proposal become law was that the ACA would increase health coverage to extend to as many as 32 million more previously uninsured

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) is a complex federal law that affects health system of the United States in every aspect. ACA goals is to improve quality of healthcare; increase access, and to stabilize and possibly reduce the cost of the healthcare services. ACA provisions include, but not limited to, expansion of Medicaid to all individuals less than 65 years of age whose income is 133% of the Federal Poverty Line (FPL) or below; created Consumer Operated and Oriented Plan a nonprofit, member-run health insurance companies in all 50 states; prohibits existing health insurers to deny coverage due to preexisting conditions; allows states to create a Basic Health Plan for individuals without health insurance and income range of 133-200% FPL; improves prevention services by requiring health plans to include basic preventive coverage without cost-sharing; improve access to health care by providing additional funds for community based health centers and other community based organizations(Knickman, Kover, 2015. Pp344-361). Every provision of ACA will bring significant change to every area of the healthcare and, as a result, changes in access, quality, and cost. These 3 components of the healthcare system are intertwined and change in one will cause the change in the others.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law on March 23rd, 2010 by President Barack Obama. This radical health care law was a much-needed step in comprehensive health insurance reform. Three important features of the Affordable Care Act are 1. Improving quality and lowering health care costs 2. New consumer protections and 3. Increased access to healthcare. (Key Features. 2014). Under the umbrella of these three key features additional benefits include free preventive care, drug discounts for senior citizens, increased protection against health care fraud, small business tax credits, increased access to health care through the health insurance marketplace, consumer assistance, and non-discrimination based on pre-existing conditions.

According to Obama, “ ObamaCare’s goals is to give more Americans access to affordable, quality health insurance, and to reduce the growth in the U.S. health care spending” (DeMichele). The ACA is a law that is needed in the United States and it has benefited our country as a whole. Another important impact of the ACA is it, “expands the affordability, quality, and availability of private and public health insurance through consumer protections, regulations, subsidies, taxes, insurance exchanges, and other reforms” (DeMichele). Furthermore, the ACA would be a big help to families who are classified as having a low or middle income.

On March 23rd, and March 30th, 2010, President Barack Obama signed the paperwork for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA). This act is a law that was put into place to help make sure all Americans could have access to affordable, quality health insurance coverage. The ACA has now been available for five years with more than sixteen million people insured through it. “Over a period of several years of implementation that began in 2010 and will continue through 2019, the spectrum of the ACA provisions will change how health care is delivered and financed in ways that vastly exceed the impacts of Medicare and Medicaid.” (Sultz & Young, 2014, p.xxiv) The ACA is a law and in this paper, I will be discussing the major components of it which are Titles I-X and how it has improved the health care delivery system in the United States. This act is extremely important to Americans because it helps to make insurance affordable and keeps premiums down.

In the case of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, democrats had observed Bill Clinton’s effort at health care reform and they had also watched republican congress use their strong points of congressional leadership to pass reforms that had previously been put on hold (Beaussier, 2012). The Democratic Congressional Party learned through others that they could use their power of partisanship to vanquish those who opposed the healthcare reform and they did just that. What is meant by this is that at the time of this PPACA bill, the house and the senates was majority ruled by the Democratic Party and were able to vote in favor of the PPACA even with those opposing the bill it wouldn’t be enough to hold it

Another important aspect of the Affordable Care Act to look at is how it is making the healthcare market a more fair and humane place. Before the ACA was signed into law, private insurance companies dominated the insurance market and had a huge say in how much they would charge you, what they would cover and most importantly if they would even grant you coverage at all due to a pre-existing medical condition. “Before the ACA, someone with cancer or mental health problems, for example, often was unable to find affordable health insurance. Some couldn't find any insurer to cover them.” (O’Donnell) Under Obamacare, unfair practices such as

The implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), popularly known as “Obamacare”, has drastically altered healthcare in America. The goal of this act was to give Americans access to affordable, high quality insurance while simultaneously decreasing overall healthcare spending. The ACA had intended to maximize health care coverage throughout the United States, but this lofty ambition resulted in staggeringly huge financial and human costs.

The health care reform laws have caused inevitable problems for doctors struggling to adapt to the bureaucratic and flawed industry. Insurance companies have largely taken control of patient care: choosing which doctors patients can see, dictating what procedures and treatments they will cover, and negotiating lower costs for medical services. The guidelines this third-party has established have put strain on the vital doctor-patient relationship. As physicians are pushed to see more patients per day to overcome pay cuts, patient satisfaction is dwindling due to rushed visits. If this trend continues, the biggest challenge I will face as a physician is preserving the crucial doctor-patient relationship, which I believe is a key ingredient of