DHH’s Second Medicaid Transparency Report Improved Over First; Still Missing Data Reports for 11 of 29 Months of Bayou Health Operation

The Department of Health and Hospitals’ second “Bayou Health Transparency Report” to the Louisiana Legislature on the Medicaid Bayou Health program includes much-improved validation of private health plans’ self-reported data, and no more of the previous DHH report’s unsupported global assertions on savings and health outcomes. However, a legislative audit released Monday finds that these two DHH reports have omitted reporting data from 11 of Bayou Health’s first 29 months of operation.

Act 212 of the 2013 Regular Session of the Legislature required DHH to submit an annual transparency report to the Louisiana Legislature on the newly-privatized form of Medicaid – the Bayou Health program that began in February 2012, consisting initially of five private health plans from which Medicaid recipients could choose to enroll for services.

DHH submitted its first transparency report on Jan. 2, 2014, covering data from July 2012 through June 2013. This meant DHH submitted no transparency report data for Bayou Health’s initial five months of operation -- February 2012 through June 2012. DHH submitted its second transparency report on Dec. 31, 2014, covering data from January 2013 through December 2013. As Monday’s audit notes, this time period duplicates six months of data already covered under DHH’s initial report. Further, the state auditor’s report notes that Act 158 of the 2015 Regular Session of the Legislature now requires the next DHH transparency report cover fiscal year 2015 data -- or July 1, 2014 through June 30, 2015, leaving Bayou Health operations for January 2014 through June 2014 unreported.

“Overall, we found that DHH addressed many of our prior recommendations in this second report, and produced a more reliable report,” said Legislative Auditor Daryl Purpera.

The audit notes that improvements include better validation of the private health plans’ self-reported data, largely through the contracting of Myers and Stauffer, LC, Certified Public Accountants. Myers and Stauffer conducted a survey DHH used to verify how data was tracked and monitored, whether definitions were appropriate, and other pertinent information. In addition, the audit notes fewer mathematical errors than in the previous report, finding errors in three of eight (37 percent) appendices linked to DHH’s report and only one material math error in the report.