w/reforming Medicaid is that the state gives the money to the counties to manage. Some of the mental health authorities are single county, but others include multiple counties.
You can't bar people from getting treatment from a specialist who can provide a service that their regular doctor believes that they need for their recovery/treatment. It's really a catch-22.
After a certain point, they'll say you can't have this or that treatment; however, you can't provide services in public hospitals for some, but not others.
If you can pay more to get the private room or the more risky -optional/experimental surgery, then they'll let you; however, you have to provide a certain level of service for everyone, regardless of whether they are on Medicaid or not.
Ultimately, it will be expensive to provide care for people on Medicaid because a lot of times they have chronic illnesses that prevent them from working. Medication and hospitalization is expensive over time.
So how do we manage the costs of a program where you can't place a quota on how many people receive the benefit (and thanks to this horrible economy more people are applying and receiving Medicaid for themselves and their kids), but...
you can't control the costs of treatment because everyone is on Medicaid for different reasons and has different needs and...
limited doctors take it and...
still assist with providing supports for vulnerable people to receive health care without putting them back in institutions like they would have been in the 1950's/1960's?
I really don't have an answer for my question, but I do think it needs to be overhauled and can't continue in its current form. The services provided really shouldn't be the issue here.
The real issue is should we come up with a better way to provide health care for the most vulnerable in our society.
If we say yes-this is a priority, then our politicans need the political will to follow through and not just push the problem off another year.
If the answer is No, then we need to consider the consequences of what to do with Medicaid. Should we continue to take money from the Feds? What would that do to these people? How will we actually solve the problem of getting insurance and services for these people that are inexpensive, but are still quality services?
After a certain point, you can't keep cutting off services to people with Medicaid. It's supposed to be health insurance for the poor so they can get health care services. If they have insurance, but can't use it (like some of the privates I know of), then why does this program exist? What good is?
As I said, I don't know what the answer to this problem is; however, we can't keep piecemealing a budget together every year and hope things get better because of it.
