Mouhamadou Ndiaye
Pronouns: He/him
Research Mentor(s): Antonios Koumpias
Research Mentor School/College/Department: Social Sciences, College of Arts and Sciences, University of Michigan-Dearborn / Other
Program:
Authors: Antonios Koumpias, Mouhamadou Ndiaye
Session: Session 3 11:00 – 12:50 a.m. Hussey Room
Poster:
Abstract
The COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE) increased pressure on health care systems, prompting the expansion of telehealth services through emergency policy changes. This was a retrospective, longitudinal analysis of U.S. state telehealth policy changes between January 2020 and December 2022. We used logistic regression to estimate the relative importance of public health, state health policy and socio-economic factors in waiving in-state licensure requirements or implementing payment parity. All states waived licensure requirements whereas 34 adopted payment parity. Populous states (odds ratio [OR] 4.602), ACA Medicaid expansion states (OR 2.938), those with governors aligned with the President (OR 1.379), and with higher elderly vaccination rates (OR 3.267) had increased odds of waivers. While, states higher young adult vaccination rates (OR 0.128), governed by a Democrat (OR 0.513), with large Medicaid and CHIP enrollee population (OR 0.369), higher employment (OR 0.289) and participant in the interstate licensure compact (OR 0.772) had decreased odds. Regarding payment parity, higher odds were observed in states with higher young adult vaccination rates (OR 37.306) employment (OR 2.442), ACA Medicaid expansion states (OR 3.040), states with certificate-of-need laws (OR 1.065) and increased financial assistance applications (OR 1.114). Lower odds of payment parity were found in states with higher elderly vaccination rates ( OR 0.121) nursing home occupancy (OR 0.345), membership in the interstate medical licensure compact IMLC (OR 0.515), and more Medicaid and CHIP enrollees (OR 0.621). These results provide evidence that socio-economic and health policy factors were the primary drivers of in-state licensure requirement waivers and payment parity adoption, with public health conditions being relatively less influential.
