Eight in 10 infants born with sickle cell disease have Medicaid coverage during their first three years of life, according to a study published in JAMA Network Open. These findings emphasize the important role that Medicaid programs play in ensuring that children with sickle cell disease can access both preventive health care and specialty sickle cell care.
In total, 1,273 newborns with sickle cell disease (born between 2015 and 2017) were identified in five states (California, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, and Tennessee) participating in the Sickle Cell Data Collection Program, funded by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The researchers found that within the first three years of life, 80.7% of newborns with sickle cell disease in the five states were enrolled in Medicaid at some point. Among those children with any Medicaid coverage, the median age of first enrollment was 2 months in California and 0 months for the other four states. Once enrolled in Medicaid, the median total coverage was 33 months for California and 37 months for Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, and Tennessee. Overall, three in 10 children (30.4%) enrolled in Medicaid had interruptions or loss in coverageover the three-year period.
“Given the high lifetime risk of disease-related complications from sickle cell disease, we know that early detection through newborn screening and subsequent enrollment into health insurance coverage are important for children’s long-term health,” says coauthor Mei Zhou, from the Georgia Health Policy Center, home to the Georgia Sickle Cell Disease Program. “Ourresults highlight that Medicaid programs are uniquely positioned to enhance early care initiation and implement recommended care to improve health outcomes of the pediatric sickle cell disease population.”
Read the full study here.