Medicaid Payer Case Study

Medicaid is a social health care program that covers nearly 60 million Americans, including children, pregnant women, seniors, parents and individuals suffering with disabilities. Medicaid is the biggest source of funding for health related services and medical needs for the people with low income in the United States. This program is funded jointly by the state and federal level governments, but it is the state’s responsibility to manage this program. The Medicaid program is not a required program that states have to use, but all 50 states have implemented this program. With the introduction of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), and its passing in 2010, the ACA unveiled its plans to expand Medicaid eligibility to nearly all low-income adults as an addition to the other groups that fall into the Medicaid eligibility. The Medicaid program had “many gaps in coverage for adults” because it was only restricted to the low income individuals and other people with needs in their own specific category. In the past, the majority of the states who had adults that did not have children dependent on those parents were not eligible for Medicaid. These low income adults without dependent children would be without medical insurance assistance before the ACA was introduced. Medicaid is now available to all Americans under the age of 65 whose family income is at or below the federal poverty guideline of “133 percent or $14,484 for an individual and $29,726 for a family of four in 2011” (NSCL).

In the state of Texas Medicaid is funded by state and federal programs. Those eligible to receive Medicare benefit is the low income individuals, families, children, pregnant women, elderly and individuals who suffer with disabilities (Hegar). The Texas Health and Human Service commission (HHSC) distributes the Medicaid (Hegar). Those receiving Medicaid benefits in the fiscal year of 2010 were found to be 55 percent female and 77 percent under the age of 21 (Hegar). Children accounted for 66 percent of all Texas Medicaid recipients in that year; however, 32 percent of those children actually received health care (Hegar).

With the implementation of the ACA, many states have expanded their Medicaid programs to include a larger population of low income individuals and families that were not able to obtain health insurance prior to the law. Some of the issues that state legislators struggle with are the overall cost of providing services for the additional recipients, staying within budget, determining an adequate approach of offering quality care, and providing adequate coverage for each recipient. Even though the cost of Medicaid expansion within each state has increased the budget for the program, new appraisals has shown that Medicaid programs spend less per enrollee than commercial health insurance and much of the increase in Medicaid expenses originate from the increase in enrollment in the programs (Coughlin, Long, Clemens-Cope, & Resnick, 2013).

Following the death of a Medicaid recipient, the program not only can but must attempt to recover costs from the estate of the deceased. Medicaid's official site says:

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) highlighted the importance Medicaid played in insuring every American receive healthcare coverage. (42 U.S.C., 2010) Medicaid provides health benefits to over 71 million across the country. While involvement is optional, all 50 states participate in the program and requirements differ across the nation. The flexibility given to each state has allowed them to make their own decisions to work towards improvements that they believe would best benefit their region (Feldstein, 2015, p. 125-126).

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2010, and on June 28, 2012 the Supreme Court decided to uphold the law.¹ Some of the most notable features that the ACA will provide for individuals are access to healthcare for everyone, new consumer protections such as pre-existing condition coverage, free preventative care, protection against healthcare fraud, small business tax credits, as well as many other features.¹

As Congress considers potential options to reform Medicaid, it is important to keep in mind patient access to prescription drugs and other healthcare services. Retail community pharmacies believe that Medicaid prescription drug benefit reform efforts should be focused on maintaining a Medicaid prescription drug benefit, maintaining patient access to adequate provider networks, fair and appropriate cost-based provider payments, and facilitating patient access to pharmacist-provided health care services.

Bill Haslam, the Tennessee state governor, announced that the state of Tennessee would accept the Medicaid expansion offer. The Medicaid expansion expands Medicaid eligibility to the region’s underserved populations living near or below the poverty line. The Medicaid expansion offer looked to be a major win for the state; however, others disagreed with this idea. Some of Tennessee’s lawmakers decided to deny the federal government’s Medicaid offer, even though many others wanted the offer to be accepted. The deal’s breakdown might be the result of “squabbling along party lines” which is a common theme at all levels of government. Although the deal was denied, it is still possible that the bill could still be passed with the help of the governor. The likelihood of Tennessee reviving its Medicaid expansion is a difficult one considering the state would have to fight. The Medicaid expansion could offer the state low-income citizens medical insurance, the state would come out of the deal with a net financial gain, and the state hospitals would come out on top.

Medicaid expansion is seen as a huge problem in this case it takes place among the 50 states. The environment includes the 50 states such as California, Texas, New York and New Jersey. Medicaid expansion offers financial protection. It also addresses the uncompensated care problem which involves paying and reimbursement for service rendered. Medicaid expansion also provides customers access to affordable coverage, as well as customers taking up that cover, which is a moral duty of the government. Medicaid also supports politically powerful interest groups who support expansion. The expansion of Medicaid helps rural hospitals stay afloat in states like Colorado, which added 400,000 people to the health insurance program under

Immigrants that work should be allowed medical coverage when they are working for American agriculture or any American employment. They are all pulling their hours and time to boosting the American economy; therefore, it is only logical for them to have private coverage. I don’t agree that they should receive state Medicaid coverage and should be left for Americans. Medicaid should not available for them until they have been in the use over ten years.

Effective May 30, 2018, the Virginia General Assembly approved Medicaid Expansion as a part of the 2019-2020 budgets. Virginia’s Governor Northam signed this approval into law on June 7, 2018, and as a result, approximately 400,000 low-income adults now qualify for health insurance (Norris, 2018). The General Assembly vote ended a “long-running partisan stalemate” with some Republicans joining the Democrats in support (The Associated Press, 2018). The Kaiser Family Foundation reports that Virginia is the 33rd state to approve the Medicaid Expansion (The Associated Press, 2018).

A Spanish-speaking member of Kentucky medicaid called in to the call center where I working in Louisville, KY. She quickly started to talk, she sounded very afraid. she was crying and begging me not to cancel her childrens medicaid. Once there was a pause I quickly stepped in and comforted her by telling her that I am here to help her the best way I can. She was acting this way because she receive a letter from the state and assumed they were going to cancel her kids medicaid because she missed an appointment, she didn't understand the letter very well and couldn't translate it for me but she did mention the name of our company was on the letter. I had an idea of what is what about but just to be 100% I asked the customer if it was not too

Medicaid fraud, regardless of who perpetrates the fraud, is misrepresenting information to obtain a benefit from Medicaid. Both the state and federal government have programs to identify and prosecute Medicaid fraud, although, currently, the emphasis is on fraud prevention. Because fraud cost the Medicaid billions of dollars each year, these programs have become sophisticated; New York routinely checks DMV records, bank accounts and other data to discover potential fraud. Whistleblowers also receive money for reporting Medicaid fraud. Everyone who participates, in any way, in the Medicaid program may be charged with fraud including:

Medicaid is both an extremely important and costly government program. The program provides medical care for those who cannot afford it and also for the elderly and the disabled. Over 69 million people were provided medical assistance through Medicaid in the fiscal year of 2011 (Herz). Medical attention is very expensive but is also something that every human being needs. Some people are individually wealthy enough to afford medical insurance. Most people are provided medical insurance through their employer. So what are those people who are unemployed and not independently wealthy supposed to do? If you have no job you have no insurance through your employer

Initial diagnosis of Streptococcal pharyngitis is determined by a point system awarding 1 point for each of the following; temperature greater than 38 C, absence of cough, tender anterior cervical lymph nodes, tonsillar swelling, age younger than 15, subtracting a point for age older than 45. If these symptoms are met, a rapid strep test will be performed before antibiotics are given, a precaution taken to prevent super-bugs from developing.