The new health care law covers preventive care but leaves open the question of who will provide it to women: general practitioners or ob-gyns? And who decides?

Credit: Alex E. Proimos on Flickr, under Creative Commons (CC BY 2.0).

(WOMENSENEWS)--Half of all American women have skipped health visits, follow ups or treatments because they couldn't afford to pay, according to a 2011 report by the Commonwealth Fund.

Women have also been paying higher health insurance premiums, with 92 percent of U.S. health plans practicing gender rating, according to a 2010 report from the National Women's Law Center. The report added that 56 percent of plans charge non-smoking women more for coverage than male smokers.

All that should change as President Barack Obama's reelection lowers the uncertainty about the Affordable Care Act and the new law continues its gradual implementation.

The predictable effect will be a major expansion of women's preventive health care. More in doubt, however, is which doctors will provide that care.

Currently, many healthy women with adequate health coverage have two primary care doctors, in contrast to men, who generally have one. Women see a primary care doctor and an obstetrician-gynecologist, a specialist who often requires a referral under current systems.

But that could change since the new health law defines certain services as primary or preventive care but leaves open the matter of who provides that care. It could be a general practitioner or internist or another primary-care provider. Or it could be the physician who does a woman's annual Pap smear, while she's in the office for a regular visit.

Read the original:

Health Question for Women: Two Doctors or One?