New State Scorecard Shows Improvements in Health Care Nationwide Following the ACA’s Coverage Expansions
<p>Two years after the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) insurance coverage expansions, every state saw improvement in access to health care, according to The Commonwealth Fund’s new state health system scorecard. At the same time, Americans overall received safer, better-quality care. Vermont is the top-ranked state, followed by Minnesota, Hawaii, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts.</p><p>States that expanded Medicaid made some of the biggest strides between 2013 and 2015 in covering residents and ensuring access to needed care. Five states that expanded Medicaid and implemented state-based insurance exchanges—California, Colorado, Kentucky, New York, and Washington—rose the most in the scorecard’s overall rankings. </p>
<p>“The scorecard gives us a comprehensive picture of how states are doing on crucial aspects of health care, allowing us to see how things look now compared to the years before the major provisions of the Affordable Care Act were implemented,” said Commonwealth Fund President David Blumenthal, M.D. </p>
<p>The scorecard ranks the health care system in each state and the District of Columbia based on 44 indicators of health care access, quality, cost, and outcomes. Access the scorecard’s findings through our <a href="/interactives/2017/mar/state-scorecard/" target="_blank">interactive digital report</a> and use our <a href="http://datacenter.commonwealthfund.org/#ind=1/sc=1" target="_blank">data center</a> to compare the performance of individual states.</p>