TY  - JOUR
AU  - Maclean, Johanna Catherine
AU  - Pesko, Michael F
AU  - Hill, Steven C
TI  - The Effect of Insurance Expansions on Smoking Cessation Medication Prescriptions: Evidence from ACA Medicaid Expansions
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 23450
PY  - 2017
Y2  - May 2017
DO  - 10.3386/w23450
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w23450
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w23450.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Johanna Catherine Maclean
Department of Economics
Temple University
Ritter Annex 869
Philadelphia, PA 19122
Tel: 215/204-0560
E-Mail: catherine.maclean@temple.edu

Michael F. Pesko
Department of Economics
Andrew Young School of Policy Studies
Georgia State University
PO Box 3992
Atlanta, GA 30302-3992
E-Mail: mpesko@gsu.edu

Steven Hill
Center for Financing, Access and Cost Trends
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
540 Gaither Road
Rockville, MD 20850
E-Mail: shill@ahrq.gov
AB  - We explore the effects of recent Medicaid expansions on Medicaid-financed prescriptions for evidence-based smoking cessation medications.  We estimate differences-in-differences models using administrative data on the universe of prescription medications sold in retail and online pharmacies for which Medicaid was a third-party payer.  Our findings suggest that expansions increased smoking cessation prescriptions by 36% with heterogeneity across medication class.  We provide evidence that these prescriptions were primarily financed by Medicaid programs and not patients, and that our estimates reflect increases in prescriptions among newly eligible populations and not other populations that enrolled in Medicaid due to Affordable Care Act-related changes.  Overall our findings suggest that the recent Medicaid expansions allowed newly insured low-income smokers to access efficacious cessation medications.
ER  -