The Implementation Of The Affordable Care Act

Understanding the complex structure of the many health care subsystems in the United States goes a long way to explaining why it is often so hard to get anything done or to create change; a system this complicated does not move quickly or easily—or sometimes, at all. Understanding that the system is made up of multiple separate and unconnected collections of financing and provision of care reveals how difficult it is to carry out any reasonable system-wide planning for the entire system and the entire population (Williams, Torrens, 2007). For these reasons the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, the first of its kind in American history, may change the way policy is implemented in the future. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was the first policy to be implemented while breaking almost all of the old legislative rules about communication and public comment and consumption.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) is the 2010 health reform act that could extend insurance coverage to as many as 32 million Americans, which also included policies that affect the quality of coverage insurers must offer (Knickman & Kovner, 2015). In addition to this, the ACA created a range of programs focused on furthering change in how medical care is organized and delivered, with a goal of reducing costs and improving quality and outcomes (Knickman & Kovner, 2015). However, these goals come at a cost. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the impact the ACA had on the population it affected in the United States as a nation, but specifically in the state of North Carolina; describe the impact of economics of providing care to patients from the organization’s point of view; examine how patients were affected by the ACA in terms of the cost, quality, and access to treatment; and explain the ethical implications of the ACA.

The Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) is a healthcare program created by president Obama’s administration. The goal of the Affordable Care Act is to make sure every United States citizen has health insurance. The Affordable Care Act provides “affordable” health insurance plans to citizens that do not have any and make about $15,000 a year. While the idea of providing health insurance to the millions of American’s that cannot afford it is great, everything comes at a cost. According to Emily Miller, Obamacare is causing people’s health insurance premiums to rise by around 1 to 9 percent (Miller 15-15). Not only are insurance premiums rising, but ever since the Supreme Court declared the Affordable Care Act constitutional approximately 20 tax hikes have been approved (Battersby). All the aforementioned reasons are helping pay for Obamacare. Although providing health insurance for people that cannot afford it is important, the Affordable Care Act should be revoked because it will hurt the economy.

The enactment of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has significantly reduced the rate of the uninsured, yet those who do not fit within the parameters of the ACA still face many obstacles in obtaining necessary healthcare. Those without insurance must rely on “locally organized [systems] of health care delivery intended to fill gaps in access to health care services for uninsured… and other vulnerable populations in medically underserved communities” (Liebert and Ameringer 2013)—understood as health care safety nets. Healthcare providers within these systems include emergency rooms, community health centers (CHC), federally qualified health centers (FQHC), and free clinics. (Liebert and Ameringer

While our understanding has evolved with respect to certain advantages of MCO’s, our understanding of the disadvantages has also grown. This analysis will evaluate the use of MCO’s as a gatekeeper to controlling health care cost and offerings. It will evaluate the advantage MCO’s provide in a rapidly growing market due to the aging of baby boomers. The analysis will evaluate disadvantages that can arise with relying on MCO’s. These disadvantages work against the insurance company forcing a polarizing balance between how much control the MCO should retain over recommendation and provision of services.

When president Obama signed the Affordable Care Act in March 2010, it came with a lot of new provisions that would vary when they would come into effect. The very first provision was the “Grandfather Clause” which allowed people to keep their insurance plan before the act went into effect. As long as the employer still offered that plan the employee could still maintain it because they were grandfathered into receiving that coverage. If someone bought an insurance plan after March 2010 they would not be considered under the Grandfather Clause. Thus, these individuals would be required to get a new plan by 2014 if their plan did not meet all the criteria, they would need to get a new plan that fills all the criteria. Another major provision of the Affordable Care Act is that patients have a guaranteed issue. This means that insurance companies are unable to deny anybody health insurance based on their health or prior health. This may create a problem because the risk pool of an insurance company may not have the best people. Eventually, this could lead to the majority of the risk pool for an insurance company to have people who are at a greater risk of needing health insurance. This will make the insurance company more vulnerable and the only way that they will be able to cover the losses is by raising the premiums on everyone even though there may be some individuals that are in perfect health. The next provision that was added under the Affordable Care Act is that the

HMOs are usually the least expensive health plans, offer predictable costs for health care, the least administrative paperwork, and cover preventive care (Barsukiewicz, Raffel, & Raffel, 2010). However, HMOs also restrict direct access to specialists by requiring referrals by a PCP, requiring patients to see a provider in the HMO network, and often not covering more costly procedures or care options, because care is managed to control excessive or unnecessary care. Providers gain if they provide less care (Austin & Wetle, 2012). This incentive could affect patient-provider trust.

Over the last five years, the United States has implemented a new policy in which Americans will receive their health care benefits. This policy is known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act which was implemented in 2010 through United States federal statue and signed into law by President Barack Obama. The intentions of the reform is to insure that all Americans have affordable access to health care benefits without struggling to afford the cost associated. The reform is broken down into nine title sections that affect all aspects of health care and changes that will be associated. In this paper, I will be discussing each of the title sections and how the changes will affect the field of nursing.

During the botched 2010 roll out of the affordable care act, multiple veteran’s agencies marched on Washington with fears of how the Tax/Mandate would affect indigent veterans who could not afford the penalty and could not afford secondary insurance. In their hubris, these agents pushed an agenda that has greatly hurt the veteran population.

The Affordable Care Act was signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2010. The Affordable Care Act also nicknamed as “ObamaCare” faced huge amounts of adversity and challenges on its way to being ratified and upheld by the Supreme Court. Some of these arguments highlight the disadvantages of free social services, the escalating federal deficit, and the altering the healthcare industry’s landscape completely. Healthcare is generally defined as providing for the wellbeing of a personal through medical services. In America, all services come with a price, and healthcare has become an industry that is nearly only about the money and less about the patient. Needless to say, the quality of care that a patient receives is almost

The Obamacare/ACA, might have helped numerous of individuals in acquiring health care, but the health professionals are facing a shortage of reimbursement difference for their services. As a result, Hospitals and healthcare providers were force to layoff personal and come up with innovative solutions. This point is proven by the renowned author, Amy Anderson by stating as follows: “The American health care framework has had shortages of personnel for quite some time and would not be prepared to give the adequate service to this amount of patients in need of medical attention. Training new professional health services personnel could take years. There is a shortage of graduates from medical and nursing schools. Doctors, nurses and health professional are sharing responsibilities prospective patients will face a longer wait time”. (Anderson, 2014)

Throughout the last half of the 20th century, employers have acted on their own to regulate health costs by requiring employees to join health maintenance organizations (HMOs). More than 100 million Americans are under managed care. However, many patients and doctors complain that HMOs impose too many regulations and sacrifice healthcare quality. HMOs are undergoing a high level of scrutiny due to criticisms that the network is controlling and jeopardizing the healthcare system of the nation.

Health care in the United States is driven by a patchwork of services and financing. Americans access health care services in a variety of ways — from private physicians’ offices, to public hospitals, to safety-net providers. This diverse network of health care providers is supported by an equally diverse set of funding streams. The United States spends almost twice as much on health care as any other country, topping $2 trillion each year. (WHO.INT 2000) However, even with overall spending amounting to more than $7,400 per person, millions of individuals cannot access the health care services they need.(Foundation 2009) So when the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (a.k.a the Affordable Care Act or ACA) was passed in the summer

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.

HMOs multiplied rapidly with the new federal giveaways. Managed care, now including PPOs, mushroomed. Employers initially perceived managed care plans as cheaper than traditional fee-for-service insurance. Gradually, they stopped offering a choice of health plans, making individual policies more expensive. HMOs' penetration of the industry had been subsidized into existence. Government had instituted managed care. Today, while overall quality of patient care remains the best in the world, doctors practice medicine in an increasingly intricate web of rationing and regulations: Physicians are stripped of professional autonomy. As patients wander the maze of managed bureaucracy, costs rise and quality deteriorates. Every American dependent on a third party for health coverage is a potential victim of managed care. And state sponsored management of medicine