Prenatal Care: Medicaid Recipients and Uninsured Women Obtain Insufficient Care
HRD-87-137
Published: Sep 30, 1987. Publicly Released: Oct 28, 1987.
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Highlights
Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO investigated the extent to which Medicaid beneficiaries and uninsured women experience difficulties in obtaining access to prenatal care to determine the: (1) timing and number of their prenatal care visits; and (2) barriers they perceived as preventing them from obtaining care earlier or more often.
Recommendations
Recommendations for Executive Action
| Agency Affected | Recommendation | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Department of Health and Human Services | The Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Administrator, Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), to develop and provide to states data on the: (1) increased costs they would likely incur in expanding Medicaid eligibility to include pregnant women with incomes up to 100 percent of the federal poverty level; and (2) corresponding decrease in costs for newborn intensive care and long-term institutional care they could expect to result from improvements in prenatal care services. |
Closed – Implemented
Congress has required states to expand eligibility to 100 percent of the poverty level.
|
| Department of Health and Human Services | The Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Administrator, HCFA, to work with states to overcome the administrative problems that prevent them from adopting the presumptive eligibility provisions of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1986. |
Closed – Implemented
A report in process shows that many states have now implemented presumptive eligibility.
|
| Department of Health and Human Services | The Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Surgeon General to expand efforts to evaluate programs to improve access to prenatal care and disseminate the results of these evaluations through the National Maternal and Child Health Clearinghouse. |
Closed – Not Implemented
Because of the variety of alternative actions taken to publicize programs to improve access to prenatal care, this recommendation is being dropped.
|
| Department of Health and Human Services | The Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Surgeon General to provide technical assistance to communities in developing comprehensive plans for identifying the most important barriers to care in the community and designing programs to help overcome those barriers. |
Closed – Not Implemented
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has indicated no plans to implement this recommendation.
|
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Birth defectsChild care programsDisadvantaged personsEligibility determinationsGrants to statesHealth care servicesHealth statisticsMedical examinationsWomenMedicaid