Kansas’ uninsured rate has risen in the past year more than any other state’s, according to a Gallup Well-Being poll released this week.

While Kansas health policy experts say the uninsured rate likely didn’t increase 5 percentage points from 2013 to 2014, as the poll states, they note the survey results aren’t totally surprising given that the state didn’t expand Medicaid or set up a state-based health insurance exchange under the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare.

“The 10 states that had the biggest decline in uninsured were states that did both Medicaid expansion and set up state exchanges,” said Kansas Insurance Commissioner Sandy Praeger, a supporter of the 2010 health care law.

According to the Gallup survey that came out Tuesday, Kansas was the only state to show any significant increase in its uninsured rate. Most states either remained flat or decreased their uninsured populations, most notably Arkansas (by 10.1 percent) and Kentucky (by 8.5 percent). Kansas’ rate went from 12.5 percent in 2013 to 17.6 percent in the middle of this year, according to the poll, which had a margin of error as high as 5 percent.

“We’re a little skeptical that the uninsured rate went up as much as it says,” said Katrina McGivern, spokeswoman for the Kansas Association for the Medically Underserved. “It means there would have had to have been an employer-sponsored insurance drop of 200,000 people, which just didn’t happen.”

Sheldon Weisgrau, director of the Kansas Health Reform Resource Project, said Kansas has traditionally had one of the lower rates of uninsured but risks losing that distinction as states that participated in the Affordable Care Act pass it by.

“And that’s going to show up in the health of our citizens and the economy of our state,” he said.

Health Care Access, the Douglas County safety-net clinic for the uninsured, has seen no change in demand in recent years, according to executive director Shelly Wakeman. Despite having 150 patients obtain health insurance through the Obamacare marketplace earlier this year, the clinic still has about 2,600 active patients, a number that is essentially unchanged from 2013.

“From the perspective of Health Care Access, we have far more people to serve than we have capacity,” Wakeman said. “So if people aren’t being seen here or at another charity clinic, they either aren’t being treated at all, are delaying care, are accessing care in inappropriate venues such as the emergency department … or are incurring bills they’ll struggle to pay in private medical offices.”

Lawrence’s other safety-net clinic, Heartland Community Health Center, has had an increase in both the number of insured and uninsured patients seeking its services this year, but spokesman Sean Hatch said that is likely because the clinic expanded its capacity.

Praeger says the status quo in health care is unsustainable. Until there is true reform, she said, the costs will continue to shift to the people who actually have insurance, and those without it will keep using the emergency room as the provider of last resort.

“The alternative of doing nothing means we will continue to have people not getting access to health care, continuing to have health status that is worse than some Third World countries, because we don’t provide appropriate care at the appropriate time in the appropriate location,” she said.