Oklahoma health insurance

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status report:
Oklahoma state health insurance exchange

What progress is being made in setting up its federally-mandated Oklahoma state health insurance exchange?"

About state health insurance exchanges

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How did Oklahoma officials vote on health reform?

H.R.2: Repealing the Health Care Bill

#14

Date of Vote: 1/19/2011 Status: House passed 245-189, 1 not voting

HOUSE|SENATE

1/19/2011--Passed House amended. Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act - Repeals the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, effective as of its enactment. Restores provisions of law amended by such Act. Repeals the health care provisions of the Health Care and Education and Reconciliation Act of 2010, effective as of the Act's enactment. Restores provisions of law amended by the Act's health care provisions. [more]

Yes (5)

• Dan Boren
• Tom Cole

• James Lankford
• Frank Lucas

• John Sullivan

how healthy is living in Oklahoma?

Oklahoma is ranked as the 46th healthiest state to live in, according to the 2010 America's Health Rankings® by the United Health Foundation. That's up three spots from 2009.

The good news:

• Oklahoma's strengths include a relatively high level of public funding ($106 per individual, as opposed to its $100 per person last year), its low binge drinking rate (12.5 percent) and a high immunization coverage rate (with 91.3 percent of children between the ages of 19 and 35 months receiving necessary immunizations).
• The rate of uninsured population has dropped in the past year, from 19.9 percent to 16.1 percent.
• Oklahoma has shown a marked decrease of infectious disease cases over the past ten years, from 42.4 cases per 100,000 population to 13.4 cases per 100,000 population this year.

The bad news:

• Oklahoma has a particularly high rate – 25.4 percent – of residents who smoke.
• Other problem areas include a limited availability of both early prenatal care and primary care physicians, a high rate of preventable hospitalizations, and a large number of deaths due to cardiovascular disease.
• The prevalence of obesity in Oklahoma has climbed in the past five years from 24.9 percent to 32 percent.

Oklahoma's best and worst category rankings:

• Prevalence of binge drinking – 10th
• Public health funding – 14th
• Immunization coverage – 18th
• Prevalence of smoking – 48th
• Cardiovascular disease (345.1 deaths per 100,000 pop.) – 48th
• Primary care physicians (80.3 per 100,000 population) – 49th

more details

• See the United Health Foundation's latest findings on Oklahoma.
• Trust for America's Health ia another source for key Oklahoma health quality findings. In addition, 2010's federal health reform, the Affordable Care Act (ACA), included the creation of a prevention fund to provide more than $16 billion over the next 10 years to invest in effective, proven prevention efforts, like childhood obesity prevention and tobacco cessation, and the site has a report on how it impacts Oklahoma here.

get local health results

State snapshot too large? Get county-by-county health rankings for Oklahoma, from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Population Health Institute at the University of Wisconsin.

does Oklahoma have a health insurance high risk pool?

Oklahoma Health Insurance High Risk Pool
Toll-free 1-877-885-3717

IMPORTANT UPDATE: Starting in 2010, Oklahoma started offering health care insurance coverage to residents through the federally established temporary high-risk pool program. To find out more about Oklahoma's participation, click here.

Risk pools are state-sponsored programs to help people with a history of medical problems in their family to purchase coverage. These pools are for people who can afford to buy health insurance, but are not able to get underwritten in the private market because of a pre-existing health condition. These programs can vary significantly from state to state in price, benefits and number of people served. Often insurance companies doing business in the state are required to contribute to the pool to keep it in the black. In the best cases, they allow people to be able to switch jobs or become self-employed without the fear of losing their health insurance coverage. Read more about risk pools here.

how to find health insurance in Oklahoma

Cover The Uninsured is a national effort to highlight the fact that too many Americans are living without health insurance and to demand solutions from our nation's leaders. Read more information on its efforts. It is a project of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

• Cover The Uninsured's facts on the uninsured in Oklahoma and all other states.
• The Foundation for Health Coverage Education's guide on how to find health insurance in Oklahoma.
• Materiales En Español – Guías para encontrar cobertura de seguro de salud.

Georgetown's Oklahoma health insurance guide

Georgetown University's Health Policy Institute has researched and written state-by-state guides for finding and keeping health insurance. It updates these guides as federal and state policies change. A number of non-profit organizations help fund its research. Learn more about the Health Policy Institute.

Review Georgetown's guide for Oklahoma.

Health insurance plan report cards for Oklahoma

The National Committee for Quality Assurance is a private, non-profit organization that, among other things, provides health care plan report cards for consumers.

Go here to search for Oklahoma health insurance plan report cards.

Oklahoma government health insurance resources

Oklahoma Health Care Authority – the primary entity in the state of Oklahoma charged with controlling costs of state-purchased health care.

SoonerCare – SoonerCare (Oklahoma Medicaid) is a health coverage program jointly funded by the federal and state government. This program helps pay some or all medical bills for many people who can't afford them.