Hospitals get cash as Medicaid expands

TRIAD — The hospitals in High Point and Thomasville will receive a total of more than $45 million out of nearly $2.6 billion being distributed statewide as the state expands Medicaid coverage at the end of this week.

The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services made the payments through the Healthcare Access and Stabilization Program on Monday to help hospitals cover the costs of expansion. Earlier this year, state leaders authorized Medicaid expansion and HASP, which will be financed through new assessments on North Carolina hospitals and will allow the state to draw down more than $8 billion each year from the federal government, based on the expected expansion enrollment of 600,000.

Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist High Point Medical Center will receive $28.69 million, and Novant Thomasville Medical Center will receive $17.21 million, figures from DHHS show.

By far the largest payment statewide will go to Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, $248.57 million.

Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem is the only other hospital coming close to that amount, at $219.86.

Cone Health in Greensboro will receive $126.31 million.

The HASP payments are calculated based on in-network Medicaid managed care payments.

Health care providers have been pushing for years for North Carolina to expand Medicaid because of the cost of medical care provided to patients who don't have private insurance but don't qualify for Medicaid.

Although hospitals in the six most populous counties in the state alone account for nearly half the money being distributed this week, in the announcement of the payments DHHS Secretary Kody Kinsley emphasized the effects that the payments and Medicaid expansion will have on financially struggling hospitals in rural areas, which serve 70 counties with 4.6 million residents.

"These payments to hospitals are a lifeline and critical as we work to strengthen rural hospitals and health systems in North Carolina," Kinsley said. "The money will ensure people covered by Medicaid and Medicaid expansion have access to comprehensive physical and behavioral health care services in the communities they live in."

On Friday, DHHS will launch Medicaid expansion in North Carolina, making an estimated 600,000 people eligible for full Medicaid coverage, nearly half of whom will automatically be enrolled because they currently have limited Medicaid family planning benefits, DHHS said.

Under the expansion, the federal government is supposed to cover 90% of the eligible costs of medical care provided under Medicaid, the state — through HASP — will cover the rest.