The Effect of Increasing Dental Payment Rates on Provider Behavior, Utilization, and Emergency Department Visits

• In Event: Impacts of Medicaid Dental Benefits Among Pregnant People, Reproductive-Age Women, and Other Adults

Abstract

We explore how an increase in Medicaid reimbursement rates for select dental services affects the provision and use of dental care. Our identification strategy exploits a plausibly exogenous increase in Medicaid reimbursement rates as part of a 2016 dental pilot program in four Wisconsin counties. Using a difference-in-differences methodology paired with the universe of Wisconsin Medicaid claims, we find that dentists were 10-63 percent more likely to serve Medicaid patients and increased the intensity of services they provided in response to higher rates. While the pilot program increased dental care use among children and adult members, emergency department (ED) use and payments for non-traumatic dental conditions remained unchanged. Our results shed new light on provider responses to financial incentives at both the extensive and intensive margins, as well as on the sufficiency of rate increases in combatting ED overuse.

Author

• Sandra Spirovska, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  Presenting Author