House, Senate Committees Approve Budgets with Likely Medicaid Cuts

WASHINGTON–The House and Senate budget committees approved
separate budgets last week that call for cuts to various benefit
programs–including Medicaid.

The Senate Budget Committee’s resolution for fiscal year 2006
calls for trimming some $14 billion from projected Medicaid
spending over the next five years. Meanwhile, the House plan calls
for Medicaid and State Children’s Health Insurance Program cuts of
$15.1 billion, but, according to some experts, those cuts could
ultimately be as high as $20 billion.

The congressional budget plans, to be put to floor votes this
week, follow President Bush’s proposal earlier this year for sharp
cuts–$60 billion over 10 years–to federal Medicaid funding to
help reduce the nation’s growing deficit. At the same time, states
are proposing their own cuts to the program, leaving HME state
associations with their hands full.

During the last several months, for example, the Michigan Home
Health Association (MHHA)–with membership that includes HME, home
health agencies and private-duty nursing–has been working with
state Medicaid to re-examine a proposed 50-percent oxygen
concentrator reimbursement cut.

Meanwhile, the Pennsylvania Association of Medical Suppliers
(PAMS) has organized a grassroots campaign against the state’s
proposed budget that has a $5,000-per-year cap on DME for
adults.

And since October of last year, Mississippi Medicaid–a program
that has come dangerously close to bankruptcy in recent weeks–has
been slowly withdrawing coverage for many DME codes, including
adult rehab products such as cushions and reclining
wheelchairs.

“Our state legislature is just not educated as to how this
equipment keeps people out of the hospital,” said Danyelle Carroll,
owner of Mobility Medical and president of the Mississippi
Association of Medical Equipment Suppliers (MAMES), which has been
communicating with state policymakers about “how cost-effective
home care really is.”

In Missouri, the Midwest Association of Medical Equipment
Services (MAMES) and other advocacy groups have been protesting
Gov. Matthew Blunt’s proposed Medicaid cuts for most adult DME. And
last week, the state’s House backed a plan to restore some $242
million of the governor’s proposed cuts, including $82 million for
services such as hospice care, ambulance rides and wheelchair
funding, according to reports.

The new plan hasn’t come without intense debate, however. To pay
for it, lawmakers had to trim almost $24 million for the state’s
MC+ for Kids program, which provides health care for families who
don’t have health insurance but do not meet the financial
requirements for Medicaid.

Opposing the plan, state Rep. Margaret Donnelly, D-St. Louis,
told the Associated Press that lawmakers “should not be balancing
the budget on the backs of the poor, disabled and particularly not
on the backs of children.”