'Health Affairs' study: One-third of doctors won't accept new Medicaid patients

Avik Roy, a Forbes columnist, has looked at data in a Health Affairs paper and found that doctors seem to like caring for uninsured patients more than they like caring for Medicaid patients.

The authors of the Health Affairs paper, which is posted behind a pay wall, looked at trends in the percentages of U.S. physicians who are refusing to take various types of new patients.

About 31% of all physicians say they are rejecting new Medicaid patients, Roy reports. Between 15% and 20% are rejecting patients with Medicare and patients with private health insurance plans. Only about 8% are rejecting new ”self-pay” patients — uninsured patients who pay for care out-of-pocket, with cash.