Related Experiment Video
Updated: Oct 20, 2025

Multidisciplinary Approach to Obesity Management: A Case Report
Published on: May 30, 2025
Preventing Financial Strain for Low- and Moderate-Income Adults: a Comparison of Medicaid, Marketplace, and
Sonali Saluja1, Cameron Kaplan2, Pooja Dhupati3
1Gehr Center for Health Systems Science and Innovation, Keck School of Medicine of University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA. sonali.saluja@med.usc.edu.
Background:
Medicaid expansion and subsidized private plans purchased on the Affordable Care Act's (ACA) Marketplaces accounted for most of the ACA's coverage gains.
Objective:
Compare access to care and financial strain between Medicaid and Marketplace plans, and benchmark these against employer-sponsored insurance (ESI) plans.
Design:
Cross-sectional survey PARTICIPANTS: A nationally representative, non-institutionalized sample of 37,219 non-elderly adults with incomes up to 400% of the federal poverty level between 2015 and 2018, and a sub-group of individuals with chronic diseases.
Main Measures:
Self-reported barriers to accessing care, cost-related medication non-adherence, and financial strain.
Key Results:
Marketplace enrollees were more likely than Medicaid enrollees to delay or avoid care due to cost (19.3% vs 10.0%; adjusted difference (AD), 8.6 [95% CI, 6.8 to 10.4]) and report difficulties affording specialty care (7.7% vs 6.6%; AD, 1.8% [95% CI, 0.3% to 3.3%]), while there were no differences in having insurance accepted by a doctor or ability to afford dental care. Marketplace enrollees were also more likely to report cost-related medication non-adherence (21.5% vs 20.0%; AD, 4.0 [CI, 1.5 to 6.4]), be very worried about not being able to pay medical costs in case of a serious accident (32.3% vs 25.8%; AD, 6.4 [CI, 4.2 to 8.6]), have expenses exceeding $2000 (22.4% vs 5.4%; AD, 8.3 [CI, 6.2 to 10.3]), and have problems paying medical bills (18.4% vs 15.6%; AD, 1.8 [CI, 0.3 to 3.9]). Marketplace-Medicaid differences were larger among persons with a chronic disease. Individuals in ESI plans fared better for most, but not all, outcomes.
Conclusion:
Medicaid offers better protections than Marketplace plans on most measures of access and financial strain.
More Related Videos
09:55Bridging the Technology Divide in the COVID-19 Era: Using Virtual Outreach to Expose Middle and High School Students to Imaging Technology
Published on: September 28, 2022
06:55Inverse Probability of Treatment Weighting Propensity Score using the Military Health System Data Repository and National Death Index
Published on: January 8, 2020
Related Concept Videos
Introduction To Health Care Delivery System
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) advocates for a patient-centered, effective, safe, timely, equitable, and effective healthcare system. The National Priorities...
Preventive Healthcare Services
Methods Of Healthcare Delivery System
Managed Care System:
The managed care system is designed to control the cost while maintaining the quality of care. The patient's care from admission to discharge is planned by the primary care provider or the case manager, also known as the gatekeeper. In a managed care system, the number of care providers is...
Standards of Care I
Issues And Trends In Healthcare Delivery System
Cost Containment
Payment for healthcare services has historically promoted adoption of costly and often unnecessary or inefficient...
Health Information Technology and Healthcare Information System
Health Information Technology, commonly called HIT, integrates advanced information systems and technology in healthcare settings. Its primary functions include: