POEM for Equity

Postpartum Outcomes and Extension of Medicaid (POEM for Equity) is a research project that uses different methods to understand how changes to Medicaid, a healthcare program, have affected people who have recently given birth. The study focuses on recent changes under a law called the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFRCA). FFCRA allowed pregnant people to have insurance coverage after the birth of their baby for longer than they did before the pandemic. Our main goal is to examine how longer postpartum coverage might have influenced access to and use of healthcare. We are interested in if this change was the same for postpartum people who were born in the United States versus immigrants, and people of different races and ethnicities.

We are using a study design that combines different research methods. First, we are analyzing data from the American Community Survey (ACS) and Medicaid claims to examine the impact of the postpartum coverage extension under the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFRCA). This analysis will help us understand how the extension affected the number of people who had continuous postpartum Medicaid coverage, their use of healthcare services after giving birth, and whether it reduced disparities in coverage and healthcare use between different communities, such as Black vs. White communities and immigrant vs. U.S.-born communities.

Additionally, we are conducting qualitative analyses using interviews with Medicaid postpartum patients and their medical providers, and Medicaid policymakers. These interviews will help us gather information on how different states implemented the FFRCA, and how these variations affected the experiences of Medicaid enrollees, healthcare providers, and policymakers involved in the postpartum coverage extension.