Managed Care Cuts Anger Disability, In-Home Care Groups
One of the state's Medicaid managed care plans is slashing the rates it pays for attendants to help the disabled and elderly with long-term care — angering in-home health providers and sparking fears that other plans could follow suit.
In a letter sent to care providers last week, Molina Healthcare officials said reimbursements for personal assistance services would be cut by 10 percent. That's the equivalent of about $1 per attendant hour — on top of the fact that care providers say Texas Medicaid already pays about $2 less per hour than any other state.
Dennis Borel, executive director of ...
Comments (4)
Dennis Borel
The fact that none of the other Medicaid managed care organizations is cutting rates begs the question as to why Molina alone can't operate within the very parameters they proposed. Their COO failed to mention the health insurance company also cut vision, dental and transportation services to Texans.
Pat Zenor
The 10% across-the-board cuts are startling. Wages of Personal Attendants should be increased, not slashed. Personal Attendants provide vital services that enable our friends, neighbors and family members with disabilities to live in their own homes and participate in their communities. Any one of us can become disabled any time. Do we want to stay in our own homes? I do. Do we want the person who bathes us to receive a liveable wage? I do. Do we have a choice? I do.
I can leave Molina!
Shani Abell
Texas should consider Self-Directed or Consumer Directed services as a cost effective, fiscally responsible alternative for Medicaid Waiver funded services. When a participant chooses to consumer direct the services, it gives employer authority back to the person receiving the services and allows the consumer to direct and manage their own care, hire the workers and select the pay rate. Ranges of pay rates authorized by the state are given to the participant to elect the appropriate pay rate for the service provider. These rates are considerably higher than that of an agency provider as the administrative costs of the agencies are eliminated by placing the authority of managing the care into the participants hands. Agency providers in my state, pay a base of $8.00 per hour which is the lowest range of pay for consumer directed services; depending on the service, $15 per hour is the top pay range. There are alternative ways to cut budgets without cutting the wages of those doing the actual work.
Another alternative is to cut the wages of the desk jobs rather than those doing the actual work, an agency that would consider this option would show the priority of the organization is that of the person receiving the services, it would show the workers that they are valued and would maintain employee stability within the agency, except for maybe the person sitting at the biggest desk.
Maria Elena Cavazos
This is so wrong, the wages of attendants are so low to begin with! A personal attendant does so much to assist a person to stay Independent and live in their own homes and be able to go out into their community to participate and now this. I am concerned about all people involved, how will the elderly or people w/disAbilities be able to manage their budgets when it comes to consumer direct services. 10% is a pretty high cut. What next? I am left to ponder and worry about what will happen when either I or a family member will be needing the assistance of an attendant. They deserve to get paid well for the work that they do. There has to be other ways then to cut the budget on personal attendant rates. Molina is so Wrong!