Dr. Epperly: ‘Saving and improving Idaho lives’

Dr. Ted Epperly, president and CEO of the Family Medicine Residency of Idaho, told senators this afternoon, “I applaud Gov. Otter for continuing to seek solutions for those who fall into Idaho’s coverage gap. It is a credit to our governor’s leadership that he appointed a broad range of experts from across the state to study this issue and the options available, and he continues to try to do what he thinks best for Idahoans.”

Epperly served on both of the governor’s Medicaid redesign task forces. He said the first outlined a plan for full Medicaid expansion, embodied in SB 1204. The second had a different charge: To design an Idaho-specific plan to serve the gap population, using federal waivers to build in a “private option” for those between 100 and 138 percent of poverty, managed care for those who would be brought into Medicaid, and other measures.

Epperly said his hope is that the committee will send SB 1205, the Health Idaho plan, to the full Senate with a recommendation that it pass. “This plan represents three years of hard work by Idaho experts on the governor’s work group, and it represents a tremendous opportunity to save Idaho taxpayer dollars, by leveraging federal dollars back to the state, and eliminating wasteful county and state programs that would no longer be necessary, not to mention the greater reason to do this, which is saving and improving Idaho lives, of low income Idahoans who fall into the coverage gap, and because of this live sicker and die younger.”

Both bills would eliminate the current state Catastrophic Care program and the county indigency program, Epperly said.

Epperly said two things drive better outcomes for patients: A “usual source of care,” and “some source of insurance coverage.” Both bills would provide both those things, he said, while the PCAP program would provide just the first, and not the second, and also wouldn’t allow the state to eliminate its state-county CAT program.

Sen. Marv Hagedorn, R-Meridian, asked Epperly if Idaho has enough doctors to handle the patients that Medicaid expansion would bring in. Epperly answered without hesitation: Yes.