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Clinic urges citizen rush on Oregon Health Plan By BILL KETTLER,Mail Tribune Jun 04, 2004 12:00 AM A A As Oregon prepares to reduce the size of its health insurance program, some health-care providers are trying to sign up more people before the door slams shut forever. As many as 1,500 Jackson County residents stand to lose their OHP benefits during the next year under a plan adopted by the Legislative Emergency Board. Despite the grim prognosis for OHP, La Clinica del Valle is encouraging people to enroll now while they still have the chance. La Clinica will offer assistance to people who want to apply for OHP membership from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on June 12 at its office at 1307 W. Main St. We're telling people to come in and get enrolled and let's hope for the best, said Maria Underwood, La Clinica's deputy director. We're hoping (the state) can afford to cover more. The Department of Human Services will close the Standard plan to new enrollment as of June 30 as part of a plan crafted by the E-Board to balance the state budget. In April, the E-Board agreed to reduce enrollment in the Standard plan from its present 50,000 to 25,000 by June 2005. — The Standard program serves mostly adults in low-paying jobs. The E-Board slashed OHP Standard to preserve coverage for OHP Plus, which provides health care for about 300,000 children, seniors, pregnant women and people with disabilities. As of late May, Jackson County had about 19,500 people ' about one in every 10 county residents ' enrolled in the health plan, including 2,878 in OHP Standard and 16,631 in OHP Plus. Health-care providers in other communities are also recruiting new OHP members, hoping to get their share of the state's vanishing health care dollars, said Rep. Alan Bates, D-Ashland. People are fighting over the last little crumbs, Bates said. It's not a healthy situation. People who remain enrolled in the Standard plan will receive benefits that cover doctor visits, prescription drugs, outpatient mental health and chemical-dependency treatment, emergency dental, laboratory procedures, X-rays, medical supplies and limited hospital benefits. A recent court ruling eliminated the co-payments that OHP members had to pay. OHP managers hope the Standard population will be reduced by attrition as members leave Oregon, or find jobs with health insurance, or are dropped from the plan for failing to pay their premiums. If attrition does not reduce the enrollment sufficiently, then the Department of Human Services may have to remove others by lowering the qualifying income below the already-low federal poverty level. They'll have to do whatever it takes to get the numbers down, Bates said. Hank Collins, Jackson County's director of health and human services, noted that OHP has shrunk steadily over the years as health care costs soared and Oregon's budget deficit deepened. At its height there were 10,000 people in Jackson County on OHP Standard. It's certainly not what it used to be, he said. If the OHP Standard reductions were spread evenly across Oregon, about 1,500 of Jackson County's present OHP Standard population would lose their benefits by next June. When those people need medical care, they will likely put more pressure on other health-care providers such as hospital emergency rooms or safety-net clinics, said Collins. They'll have to go to those places, or do without, Collins said. Local health-care providers estimate that at least 35,000 Jackson County residents have no health insurance of any kind. law, hospital emergency rooms cannot turn away patients who seek treatment but do not have the financial resources to pay. Bates said the hospitals' costs of caring for the uninsured and those who cannot pay are passed on in higher health insurance premiums. Some studies suggest as much as 20 to 25 percent of health insurance premiums go to hospitals for providing uncompensated care. Bates said higher insurance premiums can be viewed as a tax imposed on people who have health insurance to pay the medical bills of those who don't. We'll balance the budget, he said. People won't see it as a tax. They'll see it as an increase in their health insurance premium. Reach reporter Bill Kettler at 776-4492, or e-mail