Congressionally Mandated Evaluation of the Children's Health Insurance Program: A Case Study of Louisiana's LaCHIP Program

The Louisiana Children’s Health Insurance Program (LaCHIP) is a “combination” program under Title XXI, consisting of both a Medicaid expansion and a separate program. With the creation of the Children Health Insurance Program (CHIP) by the Balanced Budget Act of 1997, Louisiana’s program was the forty-third state plan approved by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). LaCHIP was originally conceived as a pure Medicaid expansion program, with a small separate program, called LaCHIP Affordable Plan, added a decade later. Throughout the decade, both programs have enjoyed strong bipartisan support in the state, including from the current Republican Governor Bobby Jindal and previous Democratic Governor Kathleen Blanco. The program is also a source of pride for state officials at the Department of Health and Hospitals’ Bureau of Health Services Financing (DHH), which has administered LaCHIP since its inception.