California HealthCare Foundation’s California Medicare Project Looks at Medicare+Choice Withdrawals
The California Medicare Project, an initiative of the California HealthCare Foundation, has released an analysis of how Californians will be affected by health plan withdrawals from Medicare+Choice next year. Roughly 84,000 Californians, or 6% of the state's Medicare managed care enrollees, will be affected by plan withdrawals on Jan. 1, a 47% increase over the number of beneficiaries impacted this year. Imperial County, for instance, will have no Medicare+Choice plans as of next year, bringing the total number of California counties with no Medicare+Choice plans to 24. Another trend identified by the Medicare Project is that health plans are increasingly "withdrawing from selected zip codes rather than the entire county"; eleven of the 37 withdrawals announced for 2002 were from certain zip codes within a county. The complete list of data tables, which provide 2002 withdrawals by county, zip code and health plan, is available online. Note: You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader to download the report (CHCF release, October 2001). For further information on state health policy in California, visit State Health Facts Online.
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