State Medicaid Programs

Posted on April 3, 2012 by townsend

• Gregoire suspends plan to limit Medicaid emergency-room visits, By Carol M. Ostrom, March 31, 2012, Seattle Times: “A plan by the state Medicaid program to stop paying for emergency-room visits for all conditions deemed ‘nonemergency’ – set to go into effect Sunday – has been suspended by Gov. Chris Gregoire pending the outcome of budget negotiations under way in the state Legislature. Gregoire’s budget director, Marty Brown, said Saturday that Gregoire on Friday stopped the Medicaid plan from going into effect, noting growing legislative support for a less-drastic alternative. The alternative plan, pushed by Rep. Eileen Cody, D-West Seattle, is a modified version of a proposal offered by emergency-room doctors and hospitals, Brown said…”
• Colorado Medicaid expansion to add 10,000, but many more out of luck, By Michael Booth, April 3, 2012, Denver Post: “Colorado’s latest Medicaid expansion is long overdue, health advocates say, but is burdened from the outset with a lottery system serving only 1 in 5 of those in need. The state starts taking applications this week for a new group of Medicaid patients – adults without dependent children – breaking a mold that long defined the insurance program in both scope and cost…”
• Uncovering kids: 89,000 poor Pa. kids slashed from Medicaid, By Michael Hinkelman and Catherine Lucey, April 3, 2012, Philadelphia Daily News: “Kheli Muhammad was trying to schedule a routine pediatrician’s appointment last summer when she discovered that her 2-year-old son, who has a congenital heart disorder, had been kicked off the Medicaid rolls. The 30-year-old mother of two boys was stunned. ‘It is written in stone that he’s covered,’ Muhammad said of Samad, who qualifies for Medicaid based on his serious medical condition, not the family’s income level. ‘He’s pacemaker-dependent . . . [H]is heart will not beat without a pacemaker.’ But the heartbeat of the fragile little Samad was clearly not a priority for welfare officials, who informed Muhammad that she had failed to renew his benefits – even though she said she had not received renewal paperwork in the mail – and that she’d have to reapply…”