ATLANTA--Blake McGee, PhD, associate professor of nursing in the Lewis College of Nursing and Health Professions, was awarded a Betty Irene Moore Fellowship for Nurse Leaders and Innovators. McGee is one of 16 nursing leaders from across the United States awarded the competitive fellowship.
The three-year program, funded by a grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, awards fellows up to $450,000 for an innovative project or study to address a gap in knowledge, alter care delivery or design a new model to advance health. The fellowships are designed to recognize early- to mid-career nursing scholars with a strong potential to accelerate nursing research, practice, education and policy.
McGee’s project will look at who is qualifying for Georgia’s “Pathways to Coverage,” a program designed by the state in 2023 as an alternate to expanding Medicaid, with the ultimate goal of developing an intervention to help low-income people receive and maintain health coverage.
Georgia is one of 10 states that has not expanded Medicaid, leaving more than 2.3 million people without medical coverage. The Pathways program provides coverage to adults below the poverty level if they work or perform qualifying activities for 80 hours each month, with no exceptions for stay-at-home parents, caregivers or people in mental health or substance use treatment. Georgia also requires Pathways beneficiaries to pay a fee for their coverage and is only available to U.S. citizens and certain permanent residents.
His project will capture demographic and clinical characteristics of enrolled and eligible beneficiaries through online and in-person surveys, along with interviews and focus groups with social workers and case managers about what resources or actions would support low-income people to maintain continuous coverage.
“The challenge in Georgia will be keeping Pathways beneficiaries eligible to maintain their enrollment,” said McGee, a former emergency department nurse who has published previously on the Medicaid expansion and the Affordable Care Act. “Working enough hours to stay eligible for Pathways while not earning above the poverty level can be difficult, and people risk losing coverage if their household size changes or their work hours fluctuate.”
McGee’s research focuses on health policy, including the impact of federal and state policy on people with cardiovascular conditions, and has been supported by the American Heart Association and the American Nurses Foundation. His previous research has shown that expanded Medicaid coverage facilitates greater access to rehabilitation care and fewer uninsured hospitalizations for stroke. Medicaid expansion also was associated with a decrease in the average cost of unplanned stroke readmissions.
Featured Researcher
Blake McGee
Associate Professor of Nursing
School of Nursing, Lewis College of Nursing and Health Professions
McGee’s research focuses on health policy, including the impact of federal and state policy on people with cardiovascular conditions, and has been supported by the American Heart Association and the American Nurses Foundation.