Evaluation of Wisconsin's BadgerCare Plus Health Insurance Expansion

The UW Population Health Institute is evaluating Wisconsin's BadgerCare Plus health insurance reform, in partnership with the Wisconsin Department of Health Services BadgerCare Plus, Wisconsin's Medicaid and SCHIP expansion, is Governor Doyle's strategy for extending access to health insurance for most Wisconsin children and many low and middle income families. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation awarded the UW Population Health Institute a grant under its State Health Access Reform Evaluation (SHARE) initiative. This funding supports a study of BadgerCare Plus enrollment, efficiency, and churning of covered members. UW was one of 15 national grantees that competed from a field of over 60 applicants to the SHARE funding initiative.

The Wisconsin Department of Health Services also supports two additional components of investigation:

1. measuring take – up rates within various populations and the effect of BadgerCare Plus on crowd-out in the private employer-sponsored insurance market; and
2. consultation on developing and evaluating the BadgerCare Plus Healthy Living and Health Literacy pilot projects.

The UW team includes

• Donna Friedsam, Project Director
• Tom Deleire, PhD, Co-Principal Investigator
• Tom Oliver, PhD, Co-Principal Investigator
• D. Paul Moberg, PhD, Consulting Investigator
• Alison Bergum, MPA
• Lindsey Leininger, PhD
• Bobbi Wolfe, PhD
• Staff researchers at the UW Institute for Research on Poverty
• Graduate students Emma Hynes and Lilly Shields