Regulations, Forms & Other Useful Documents
Affordable Insurance Exchanges and Enrollment: Meeting Rural Needs
Author(s): Bryan Garter, Keith J. Mueller,
Sponsoring organization: Rural Policy Research Institute
Reviews the principal characteristics of exchanges that will affect how well they meet the needs of rural residents, including the structure, governance, and process for enrollment.
Date: 01 / 2012
Causes and Consequences of the Rural Uninsured and Underinsured
Author(s): Joe Blankenau, Jon M. Bailey, Julia Hudson
Sponsoring organization: Center for Rural Affairs
Details health insurance coverage in rural America. Includes how rural citizens get insurance coverage and how it differs from urban America, reviews research that explores obstacles in attaining health insurance, addresses the problem of underinsurance, and explores the impact of inadequate financing for health care and its effects on the community.
Date: 04 / 2009
Chartbook #13: Health Care in Urban and Rural Areas, Combined Years 1998-2000
Author(s): Sharon L. Larson, Steven R. Machlin, Alice Nixon, Marc Zodet
Sponsoring organization: Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
Examines the differences in health care access, use, and expenses between urban and rural areas. Counties are classified along the urban-rural continuum according to whether they are metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) and, if not, their proximity to an MSA. An MSA is a large population nucleus with a high degree of economic and social interaction. The categories along the continuum are metro (counties in an MSA), near-metro, near-rural, and rural.
Date: 06 / 2004
Financial Burden of Medical Care: Early Release of Estimates From the National Health Interview Survey, January - June 2011
Author(s): Robin Cohen, Renee Gindi, Whitney Kirzinger
Sponsoring organization: National Center for Health Statistics
Addresses financial burden of medical care by selected demographics. Discusses poverty status, age groups, and race and ethnicity.
Date: 03 / 2012
Five Facts About the Uninsured
Sponsoring organization: Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured
Provides basic facts that explain why so many people in America lack health coverage and how being uninsured affects their health and financial security.
Date: 09 / 2011
Health Care Access and Use Among the Rural Uninsured (Policy Brief)
Author(s): Erika C. Ziller, Jennifer D. Lenardson, Andrew F. Coburn
Sponsoring organization: Maine Rural Health Research Center
Examines access to care and service use among non-elderly, uninsured rural and urban residents compared to each other and to their insured counterparts.
Date: 11 / 2011
Impact of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act on Covered Persons as Amended
Author(s): Tim McBride
Sponsoring organization: RUPRI Center for Rural Health Policy Analysis
An analysis of the Patient Protection and Affordable Coverage Act (as amended on December 19, 2009 by the Senate Majority Leader’s Manager’s Amendment) using statistics and data to identify how it would reduce the number of uninsured in non-metropolitan areas.
Date: 12 / 2009
Impact of the Recession on Rural America: Rising Unemployment Leading to More Uninsured in 2009
Author(s): Timothy McBride, Leah Kemper
Sponsoring organization: RUPRI Center for Rural Health Policy Analysis
Presents the results of state and county analysis of unemployment rates nationally in urban and rural (non-metropolitan) areas over the period 2007-February 2009 and discusses the impact of rising unemployment on uninsurance in rural areas and their combined impact on the need for health care reform.
Date: 06 / 2009
Income Divide in Health Care: How the Affordable Care Act Will Help Restore Fairness to the U.S. Health System
Author(s): Sara R. Collins, Ruth Robertson, Tracy Garber, Michelle M. Doty
Sponsoring organization: Commonwealth Fund
Presents results from a survey revealing data on uninsured adults and children living in poverty. Describes how the Affordable Care Act (ACA) will work to reduce these uninsured rates.
Date: 02 / 2012
Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2010
Author(s): Carmen DeNavas-Walt, Bernadette D. Proctor, Jessica C. Smith
Sponsoring organization: U.S. Census Bureau
Provides the latest income, poverty, and health insurance data from the Current Population Survey.
Date: 09 / 2011
Modernizing Rural Health Care: Coverage, Quality and Innovation
Sponsoring organization: UnitedHealth Center for Health Reform and Modernization
Examines health needs of rural populations, and how well the health care system addresses them. Presents new data on rural care quality; on the
views of people living in rural areas; rural networks; rural telemedicine; and what their physicians see as the major challenges to overcome. This is the sixth in a series of working papers by UnitedHealth Group focusing on health reform topics.
Date: 07 / 2011
Profile of Rural Health Insurance Coverage: A Chartbook
Author(s): Jennifer D. Lenardson, Erika C. Ziller, Andrew F. Coburn, Nathaniel J. Anderson
Sponsoring organization: Maine Rural Health Research Center
Provides information on the health insurance
status of rural Americans under the age of 65. Includes recent estimates and changes since 1997 in rural health insurance coverage; differences in the demographic, socio-economic, employment and other risk factors for uninsurance among rural and urban residents; demographic and economic characteristics and employment differences of the rural and urban uninsured; and policy implications for covering the rural uninsured.
Date: 06 / 2009
Rural Coverage Gaps Decline Following Public Health Insurance Expansions
Author(s): Ericka Ziller, Andrew Coburn
Sponsoring organization: Maine Rural Health Research Center
Assesses how uninsured rates and sources of coverage have changed since the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) was enacted. Compares the health insurance coverage of rural and urban residents in 1997 and 2005. Discusses implications for health insurance reform
Date: 02 / 2009
Rural Residents More Likely to be Underinsured
Sponsoring organization: Maine Rural Health Research Center
Multiple studies have demonstrated that rural residents, particularly those living far from urban areas, have high uninsured rates. However, even those with private health insurance coverage can be at risk of having high out-of-pocket health care costs. Understanding the degree to which rural residents are "underinsured" has important implications for rural health policy and practice.
Date: 2006
Rural Workers Would Benefit from Unemployment Insurance Modernization
Author(s): Anne Shattuck
Sponsoring organization: Carsey Institute
Suggests that rural workers can benefit if states adjust their unemployment insurance plans to include part-time employees because, on average, there is a higher number of part-time employees in rural areas.
Date: 05 / 2009
Rural-Urban Comparison of a Building Blocks Approach to Covering the Uninsured (Policy Brief)
Author(s): Timothy McBride
Sponsoring organization: RUPRI Center for Rural Health Policy Analysis
Uses a health insurance model to compare the effects of a building blocks approach on health insurance coverage and health spending, focusing on the geographic differences (by metropolitan and non-metropolitan) of this approach.
Date: 06 / 2009
Why Rural America Needs a Public Health Insurance Plan
Author(s): Jon M. Bailey
Sponsoring organization: Center for Rural Affairs
Examines arguments for a public health insurance plan, how the public health insurance plan would address the health care challenges that exist for rural areas, and how the choice of a public health insurance plan option is important to the viability of rural America.
Date: 07 / 2009
Terms & Acronyms
CMS (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services) Federal agency responsible for the Medicare and Medicaid programs. Part of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.
Medicaid Federal assistance program that helps pay for medically necessary services for needy and low income individuals. The program uses state and federal funds to compensate medical providers serving these populations.
Medicare Federal health care insurance program for most adults age 65 and older and certain disabled individuals. It pays for long term care under limited circumstances and for limited periods of time.
Safety Net Support for healthcare. External support consists of local taxes, state and federal aid, and private programs or donations. Internal strategies adopted by health care facilities include increasing or stabilizing the supply of physicians in the community, changing the scope of services, forging cooperative relationships with other rural providers, and merging with providers outside the community.
SCHIP (State Children's Health Insurance Program) A State and Federal partnership to help children without health insurance, many of whom come from working families with incomes too high to qualify for Medicaid but too low to afford private health insurance.
Underinsured People with public or private insurance policies that do not cover all necessary medical services, resulting in out-of-pocket expenses that exceed their ability to pay.
