Uninsured Patients 36 Percent More Likely To Get Medical Appointments Than Medicaid Patients

Posing as patients, researchers made almost 13,000 calls to doctors’ offices in ten states, seeking appointments for a variety of ailments. For those posing as privately insured patients, they got appointments 85 percent of the time. For those posing as patients on Medicaid, they only got appointments 58 percent of the time. Researchers also posed as uninsured patients who were willing to pay in full at the time of the appointment.

The result? 78 percent were successful (for appointments costing more than $75) — 36 percent better than those posing as Medicaid patients and quite close to those posing as privately insured.

Read the entire column at The Independent Institute's Beacon blog or John Goodman's Health Policy Blog.