Coverage

For Rural Seniors, Improving Overall Health Requires Improving Oral Health Care

Oral health matters for seniors in rural America. In rural areas, nearly one-fifth of residents are 65 and over. This population faces major barriers to good oral health, including cost, lack of denta...

For California’s Rural Seniors, Improving Oral Health Care Could Mean Better Health

Oral health matters for seniors in rural California. This population faces major barriers to good oral health, including cost, lack of dental coverage, and limited access to providers. Without address...

Families USA Joins Oral Health, Senior Advocates in Support of Medicare Dental Benefit Act

Families USA is encouraged to see oral health coming up early in the 116th Congress with Senator Cardin introducing S. 22, the Medicare Dental Benefit Act of 2019 earlier this week. This legislation s...

A Deep Dive into the Connections Between Oral and Behavioral Health

Oral health is an important aspect of overall health and influences physical and mental well-being, but receives less of its fair share of attention and resources. For people with mental health condit...

Oral Health for All: Addressing Dental Coverage for Grownups in Congress and the States

Oral health coverage for adults is excluded from Medicare and minimal in most state Medicaid programs. Luckily, some federal and state lawmakers are realizing what we all know—that oral health is cr...

Health Care Victories in the 2018 State Legislative Sessions

While congressional health care legislation stalled and federal actions undermined provisions of the Affordable Care Act, state policymakers stepped up to address a range of issues affecting health ca...

Community Health Workers: Key Partners in Improving Children’s Health and Eliminating Inequities

Community Health Workers are frontline public health workers who are trusted members of, and deeply rooted in, the communities they serve. Increasingly, CHWs are recognized as playing a unique and inv...

Health Coverage Matters for Children: The Role of Medicaid in the Healthy Development of America’s Children

Access to health care is crucial to children’s health and development. When children have health insurance, they are more likely to get the health care they need. For more than 40 percent of childre...

The Public Charge Rule: What it Means and What You Can Do to Stop It

On October 10, 2018, the Trump administration published a proposed rule in the Federal Register that would make it much harder for immigrants to obtain visas (including visas to study or work in the U...

There’s no pain-free way to get beyond silver loading

This blog’s readers know that President Trump’s termination of federal cost-sharing-reduction (CSR) payments in late 2017 had unexpected effects. Intended as a deadly blow to the Affordable Care A...