Issue Briefs , Regulatory Analysis | Jan 23, 2015

Short-term, Limited-duration Insurance and Excepted Benefits

Kayla Connor, Georgetown Health Policy Institute, Center on Health Insurance Reforms

Excepted benefits and short-term, limited-duration insurance are insurance products that are exempted from the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) consumer protections.  Recent questions from several states have indicated that some confusion exists about which insurance products qualify as “excepted benefits” and are therefore exempt from several requirements of the ACA, such as coverage for preventive health services, a prohibition on lifetime limits, and minimum value requirements.  This issue brief, prepared by the Georgetown University Health Policy Institute’s Center on Health Insurance Reforms, provides a framework of the federal law governing requirements for identifying both “short-term, limited-duration” insurance and “excepted benefits,” walking through the categories of excepted benefits and discussing particular product types in detail.


Expert Perspectives

October 11, 2024

CMS Offers New Details on Account Transfer 2.0

The Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services (CMCS) explained the transition to “Account Transfer 2.0” (AT 2.0) in a CMCS Informational Bulletin (CIB) released on October 10, 2024. The CIB indicates significant federal investment in improving the process of transferring consumer application information between state Medicaid and CHIP agencies and the Marketplace in the states using the federal platform. This expert perspective reviews the CIB and highlights opportunities for states to improve account transfer data under the CIB.

CMS Solicits Comments on Medicaid/CHIP Reporting Templates for Mental Health and Substance Use Disorder Parity

On September 9, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released a new collection of federal Medicaid and CHIP reporting templates designed to assist states in monitoring Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) compliance in Medicaid and CHIP. Informal public comment is requested by December 2, 2024. This expert perspective reviews the reporting templates to highlight considerations for states and support the formulation of comment submissions.

September 27, 2024

States Have New Flexibility to Add Adult Dental Care to Essential Health Benefits

On April 2, 2024, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services offered a new option for states to update their essential health benefits (EHB) benchmark plan to require coverage of routine adult dental benefits. While there are multiple drivers of inequities in oral health, a primary barrier to accessing dental services is the cost of care, a barrier that can be reduced with dental insurance. This expert perspective provides an overview of the newly available flexibility and discusses considerations for states weighing whether to add a requirement that plans subject to EHB cover routine adult dental care.