Health News
- Bill To Make Medicaid Managed-care Firms Pay Up, And More Promptly, Nears Final Form In House And Will Get Attention In Senate
By Molly Burchett and Al Cross Kentucky Health News The complaints by many health-care providers about Medicare managed-care firms' delay or denial of payment claims appears to be generating a bipartisan solution in the General Assembly. A bill on...
- Republican Legislators Keep Hammering State Officials And Managed-care Companies About Medicaid Payment Delays
Republican lawmakers reitarated this week that the companies managing Medcaid in Kentucky are still not paying health providers promptly. According to Sen. Joe Bowen, R-Owensboro, in the year since the state moved more than a half a million people to...
- Managed-care Executives Acknowledge Problems, Say They're Trying To Fix Them
Executives of three managed-care companies who run most of the state's Medicaid program told a legislative committee yesterday that they are aware of "significant problems" with their management since they took over in November, and they are "committed...
- Responding To Complaints About New Managed-care Companies, State Auditor Asks For Claims Data; Lawmakers Threaten Subpoena
With complaints piling up about the three Medicaid managed-care companies that coordinate care for 560,000 poor and disabled Kentuckians, lawmakers and officials are taking action to get to the bottom of the situation. After health providers complained...
- Move To Managed Care On Track For Oct. 1, Secretary Says
Despite a recent request to delay by an advisory council, and a low number of signups by hospitals so far, the move to managed care for Kentucky's Medicaid patients should be completed by Oct. 1. "We are prepared to proceed with an Oct. 1 timeframe,"...
Health News
More complaints lodged about Medicaid managed care; lawmakers demand answers
Complaints continue to pile up about the state's new Medicaid managed care plans, which cover about 560,000 Kentuckians. Lawmakers are hearing gripes from providers who say they are not getting paid, and from patients and clinics who say the three managed-care companies take too long to give permission for certain care.
"It's a drastic change to the system," Neville Wise, the state's acting Medicaid commissioner, told the Senate Health and Welfare Committee yesterday. "We didn't expect the level of issues that we had."
Sen. Julie Denton, a Louisville Republican who chairs the committee, "expressed outrage about a case in which she recently called the president of one company trying to get care authorized for a battered domestic violence victim who sought treatment at a Lexington clinic on a Friday afternoon," reports Deborah Yetter of The Courier-Journal.
Despite Denton's call to Coventry Health Care, the woman was not able to get a scan for a shoulder injury until the following Monday. "This woman had to go in pain all weekend because she couldn't get the services she needed," Denton said. "This is not acceptable, and this is only one instance that I know of."
Denton also asked about late payments to providers. "The payment issues have gone on way too long, and it should have been better," Wise responded.
Kentucky moved to three managed care companies Nov. 1, in an effort to save the state money and balance the Medicaid budget. (Read more)
- Bill To Make Medicaid Managed-care Firms Pay Up, And More Promptly, Nears Final Form In House And Will Get Attention In Senate
By Molly Burchett and Al Cross Kentucky Health News The complaints by many health-care providers about Medicare managed-care firms' delay or denial of payment claims appears to be generating a bipartisan solution in the General Assembly. A bill on...
- Republican Legislators Keep Hammering State Officials And Managed-care Companies About Medicaid Payment Delays
Republican lawmakers reitarated this week that the companies managing Medcaid in Kentucky are still not paying health providers promptly. According to Sen. Joe Bowen, R-Owensboro, in the year since the state moved more than a half a million people to...
- Managed-care Executives Acknowledge Problems, Say They're Trying To Fix Them
Executives of three managed-care companies who run most of the state's Medicaid program told a legislative committee yesterday that they are aware of "significant problems" with their management since they took over in November, and they are "committed...
- Responding To Complaints About New Managed-care Companies, State Auditor Asks For Claims Data; Lawmakers Threaten Subpoena
With complaints piling up about the three Medicaid managed-care companies that coordinate care for 560,000 poor and disabled Kentuckians, lawmakers and officials are taking action to get to the bottom of the situation. After health providers complained...
- Move To Managed Care On Track For Oct. 1, Secretary Says
Despite a recent request to delay by an advisory council, and a low number of signups by hospitals so far, the move to managed care for Kentucky's Medicaid patients should be completed by Oct. 1. "We are prepared to proceed with an Oct. 1 timeframe,"...