Abstract
- Issue: With many states expanding Medicaid eligibility, individuals leaving jail or prison are now often able to enroll in health coverage upon release. It is increasingly clear, however, that coverage alone is insufficient to address the often complex health and social needs of people who cycle between costly hospital and jail stays.
- Goals: To identify emerging trends in the care delivery models that state Medicaid programs use for former inmates.
- Methods: Literature review and interviews with state officials, plans, and providers.
- Key Findings: The care delivery models for individuals leaving jail or prison provide comprehensive primary care, typically including: data exchange to ensure providers are notified when someone is leaving jail or prison; “in-reach” to help inmates establish a relationship with a primary care provider prior to release, identify health conditions, and set up community-based care; strategies for addressing housing issues and other social determinants of health; use of a peer-support specialist who has experienced incarceration; and specialized training for primary care providers and specialists who work with the formerly incarcerated.
- Conclusion: With a foundation of insurance coverage, states have developed a range of promising, replicable approaches to providing care to people leaving jail or prison.
Introduction
Before the Affordable Care Act (ACA), most adults leaving prison or jail — despite their poverty and poor health — were not eligible for Medicaid because coverage generally was not available to most childless low-income adults. But as of June 2018, 33 states and the District of Columbia had expanded Medicaid to all adults with incomes below 138 percent of the federal poverty level (FPL), creating a significant opportunity to provide coverage to people after their release from jail or prison.1 Many states have focused on enrolling eligible adults into Medicaid before they leave, ensuring that coverage begins immediately upon release.2 As states gain more expertise enrolling these individuals into Medicaid, it is becoming clear that simply signing people up for coverage is not enough. To take full advantage of the opportunity created by Medicaid expansion, it is important to determine how to effectively deliver care to people leaving prison, especially given their high rates of mental illness, substance use disorders, and physical health problems, as well as the numerous barriers to securing housing, food, and other social supports that affect health outcomes (Exhibits 1 and 2). Such strategies can help to reduce recidivism and related costs — average annual cost per prison inmate was $33,274 — and unnecessary emergency department visits and hospitalizations.3
Exhibit 1
Significant Medical and Behavioral Health Needs Among Individuals with a History of Incarceration
- An estimated 80 percent of individuals released from prison in the United States each year have a substance use disorder, or chronic medical or psychiatric condition.4
- Incarcerated individuals have four times the rate of active tuberculosis compared to the general population, nine to 10 times the rate of hepatitis C, and eight to nine times the rate of HIV infection.5
- Correctional facilities in Los Angeles County, New York City, and Cook County, Illinois, have become the three largest mental health care providers in the country.6