By Claudia Calhoon, MPH, Director of Health Advocacy, New York Immigration Coalition; Laura F. Redman, Director, Health Justice Program, New York Lawyers for the Public Interest; and Sarika Saxena, Staff Attorney, Health Justice Program, New York Lawyers for the Public Interest

The release of the 2015 Open Enrollment report from the New York State of Health (NYSOH) demonstrates that NYSOH made important progress in reaching New York’s culturally diverse immigrant communities this year. The New York Immigration Coalition (NYIC) and New York Lawyers for the Public Interest (NYLPI) supported a number of strategies for effective outreach, such as a Spanish-language version of the web portal and outreach materials in 17 different additional languages. HCFANY is excited to see that New York has made concrete progress toward making the Marketplace friendly and accessible for all immigrant communities.

Other important accomplishments in the report include:

• 13% of enrollees selected Spanish as their primary language (as opposed to 10% in 2014)
• 25% of Marketplace enrollees describe themselves as Hispanic, a population that is disproportionately likely to be uninsured (an increase from 21% in 2014)
• Help from the NYSOH call center was given in 92 different languages, suggesting that information on coverage is reaching a wide array of diverse communities.
• Availability of an interactive calendar of events, navigation tools, and new “How to” videos in English and Spanish.

These successes point to the Affordable Care Act’s approach of working with in-person assistors, NYSOH Navigators and certified application counselors. Many Navigators and CACs work at strong culturally competent and language proficient immigrant-serving organizations, offering enrollment assistance in a total of 48 different languages.

The report also highlights important areas for improvement for open enrollment 2016 and beyond. Enrollment for French, French Creole, Italian, Korean, and Russian speakers does not appear to have increased. Consumers who speak languages other than English and Spanish would benefit from a calendar, navigation tools, and videos in other languages. And improved data on racial and ethnic minority and language groups will be essential to help inform targeted and innovative outreach and engagement strategies to make sure all immigrant communities can benefit fully from the ACA. While it is evident that information may be getting to diverse communities, information on enrollment outcomes is not available. Unfortunately, 31% of enrollees chose not to report their race, and 12% chose not to report their ethnicity, which represents a large gap in our knowledge. HCFANY members like the NYIC and NYLPI will continue to work with NYSOH to identify strategies to improve data collection and to educate health consumers about why sharing racial and ethnic identity information is safe and important.

This is the fourth in a series of blog posts about the NYSOH 2015 Open Enrollment Report.