Medicaid: State and Federal Actions Have Been Taken to Improve Children's Access to Dental Services, but Gaps Remain
Highlights
Children's access to Medicaid dental services is a long-standing concern. The tragic case of a 12-year-old boy who died from an untreated infected tooth that led to a fatal brain infection renewed attention to this issue. He was enrolled in Medicaid--a joint federal and state program that provides health care coverage, including dental care, for 30 million low-income children--but, like many children in Medicaid, he experienced difficulty finding a dentist who would treat him. At the federal level, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), oversees Medicaid. In this report, GAO examined (1) state strategies to monitor and improve access to dental care for children in Medicaid and (2) CMS actions since 2007 to improve oversight of Medicaid dental services for children. GAO surveyed all state Medicaid programs and interviewed state and federal officials, and dental researchers and associations
State Medicaid programs reported that they use multiple strategies to monitor and improve access to dental services for children, but problems persist. Most states responding to our survey use a variety of tools, such as examining claims and utilization data, to monitor the provision of dental services to children in Medicaid. Although all 21 states that provide Medicaid dental services through managed care organizations (MCO) reported that they set measurable access standards for MCOs, 14 states reported that MCOs do not meet all of the state's dental access standards. Almost all states described initiatives to improve access to dental services, including simplifying claims processing, increasing reimbursement rates, recruiting providers, and educating beneficiaries. Nonetheless, access rates remain low and states reported that long-standing barriers hinder further improvement. Since May 2007, CMS has taken steps to strengthen its oversight of Medicaid dental services for children, but gaps remain. For example, CMS reviews of Medicaid dental services in 17 states identified a number of concerns and made recommendations for improvement. Nonetheless, at the time of our review CMS did not plan to perform more reviews, even though other states had utilization rates well below HHS's 2010 target for low-income children receiving a preventive dental service. CMS also provided guidance to states and facilitated collaboration among stakeholders, but states reported needing more CMS support, including guidance on setting dental payment rates, on quality initiatives, and on promoting outreach. States also reported wanting more information on other states' efforts to improve dental utilization.
Recommendations
Recommendations for Executive Action
| Agency Affected | Recommendation | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services | To strengthen monitoring of state Medicaid dental services for children and help states improve children's access to Medicaid dental services, the Administrator of CMS should develop a plan to review dental services for Medicaid children in all states with low utilization rates, such as those not meeting HHS's Healthy People 2010 targets. | In October 2009, the Director of CMS's Center for Medicaid and State Operations testified that CMS concurred with GAO's recommendation, recognized the need to continue the state review process, and had undertaken a number of activities taken action to improve access to Medicaid dental services for children. Subsequent to the hearing, CMS described plans to review states with low dental utilization through (1) setting oral health goals for states, (2) requiring states to report dental utilization, and (3) measuring progress and identifying gaps in state Medicaid dental programs. Specifically CMS's April 2011 Oral Health Strategy indicated that two national oral health goals for children,... increasing children's utilization of preventive dental services by at least ten percentage points nationwide and increasing the rate of children ages 6-9 who receive a dental sealant, would be applied at the state level with the intent that corresponding state goals would drive the achievement of national goals. CMS also issued a technical brief in February 2012 to assist states in the collection and reporting of the two initial core set dental measures that affect the oral health of children. Finally, based on data provided by states, CMS has calculated baseline and goal percentages for each state and monitored key indicators of children's access to Medicaid dental services in each state. CMS also reported plans to identify barriers to access and provide technical assistance to states to help improve access to Medicaid dental services.
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| Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services | To strengthen monitoring of state Medicaid dental services for children and help states improve children's access to Medicaid dental services, the Administrator of CMS should ensure that states found to have inadequate MCO dental provider networks take action to strengthen these networks. |
CMS issued a rule in 2016 to strengthen the adequacy of managed care networks in the Medicaid program. States must develop quantitative time and distance standards for pediatric dental providers and must submit documentation of the state's analysis supporting the certification of the network for each contracted managed care organization. If CMS finds networks to be inadequate, the agency may disapprove the health plan contracts or require a corrective action plan from the state.
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| Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services | To strengthen monitoring of state Medicaid dental services for children and help states improve children's access to Medicaid dental services, the Administrator of CMS should work with stakeholders to develop needed guidance on topics of concern to states. | In an October 7, 2009 hearing, the Director of CMS's Center for Medicaid and State Operations cited our recommendation and testified that, in response, CMS was actively engaged with a range partners by way of CMS's Oral Health Technical Assistance Group, meetings with stakeholders, and ongoing workgroups. Since then, CMS has developed and shared additional guidance to help states improve access to Medicaid dental services for children, including a February 2012 technical brief to assist states in the collection and reporting of the two initial core set dental measures that affect the oral health of children. According to the brief, it was the first of a series of documents designed to...
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| Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services | To strengthen monitoring of state Medicaid dental services for children and help states improve children's access to Medicaid dental services, the Administrator of CMS should identify ways to improve sharing of promising practices among states. | CMS has taken a number of actions to share promising practices among states and other stakeholders. On June 15, 2012 CMS issued an informational bulletin, indicating that it would be providing technical assistance to states in an effort to identify and share promising practices states had used to increase children?s access to oral health care. CMS also launched a series of informational seminars, called learning labs, that provided states an opportunity to share promising practices they had implemented. For example, CMS's learning labs in 2012 and 2013 covered topics such as developing a state action plan using state data, successful beneficiary outreach strategies, engaging more general...
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