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The purpose of “The Hawaii Coverage for All Project,” is to develop programs, policies and financing schemes to provide health insurance and health care access to all Hawaii residents. The project is funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (US HHS), Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), through a State Planning Grant (SPG) to the State of Hawaii, Department of Health (DOH).
The overall State Planning Grant is executed as a cooperative activity directly involving four organizations: The Hawaii State Department of Health (DOH); The Hawaii Institute for Public Affairs (HIPA), Hawaii Uninsured Project (HUP); University of Hawaii at Manoa (UHM), Social Science Research Institute (SSRI); and the Hawaii Health Information Corporation (HHIC). The role the University is to provide a scientific and factual basis for decision-making and prepare evidence-based information for policy-makers and the larger community.
A hallmark of the HRSA SPG as executed in Hawaii is broad-based policy deliberations founded on fact and reason. An important input into those deliberations has been research results produced by the University of Hawaii in collaboration with the Hawaii Health Information Corporation, under the direction of the Hawaii Department of Health and in consultation with the Hawaii Uninsured Project. During the first three years of the Hawaii HRSA SPG research was conducted to characterize the uninsured and to model the impact of various proposed and existing public policies designed to extend or maintain health insurance coverage. A wide variety of research methods were employed including ethnographic research based on one-on-one interviews with uninsured individuals, statistical and econometric analysis of survey, health plan and hospital discharge data, theoretical analysis of labor market and health insurance interactions, and economic experiments conducted in a laboratory setting to micro-simulate employer mandates. Results were presented to the Hawaii Uninsured Project work groups and leadership group meetings and at other community venues as the policy deliberations continued.
