If Pennsylvania moves ahead and expands Medicaid eligibility as envisioned in the Affordable Care Act, the ability of newly enrolled recipients to obtain medical care may be jeopardized by the reluctance of some physicians to take on more Medicaid patients.
According to a recent article in the journal Health Affairs, 68 percent of the state’s doctors are currently accepting new Medicaid patients.  Those who are not cite low reimbursement rates and already-high patient loads among the reasons they are not accepting new Medicaid patients.
Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett has not revealed whether he intends to expand Medicaid eligibility in the state and is not expected to do so until after the November election.  The mandatory Medicaid expansion, part of the 2010 health care reform law, was ruled unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court, leaving expansion decisions to the individual states.
The Pennsylvania Department of Health says that 94 percent of rural doctors and 84 percent of the state’s urban doctors currently care for Medicaid patients.
Read more about the situation in Pennsylvania today and its implications for Medicaid expansion in this Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article.