Medicaid

Illinois improperly paid Medicaid managed care plans on behalf of beneficiaries who were deceased, according to a new report from the HHS Office of Inspector General that is the latest in a series of audits that found at least eight states have issued Medicaid payments on behalf of dead people.

Advocates for Medicaid expansion in Nebraska filed a lawsuit Wednesday (Aug. 28) seeking to force state officials to implement voter-approved Medicaid expansion nearly a year earlier than the Republican governor’s planned October 2020 launch date.

The Trump administration’s so-called public charge rule will deter many immigrant families from enrolling their children in Medicaid, potentially undermining decades of work to expand children’s coverage, the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families argues in a new report.

CMS on Friday (Aug. 23) instructed state Medicaid agencies on how to take full advantage of federal rules that allow them to recoup money from the U.S. sponsors of legal immigrants if those immigrants use Medicaid benefits, including potentially suing the sponsors if they don’t pay up.

CMS agreed to clarify diagnostic code requirements, assist states Medicaid agencies in correctly reporting the National Provider Identifiers (NPIs) of providers who prescribe opioids and ensure all beneficiaries can be uniquely identified in the national Medicaid claims database after an HHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) report said that national data are incomplete.

Many of the people who gained coverage after the enactment of the Affordable Care Act did so by enrolling in Medicaid despite apparently having incomes that should have disqualified them from the program, according to a new study released by the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Seventeen states and the District of Columbia are involved in lawsuits challenging the controversial so-called public charge rule finalized Monday, arguing that the rule undermines the role of public programs such as Medicaid and does not improve self-sufficiency for immigrants.

A federal appeals court on Tuesday (Aug. 13) reversed a lower court’s ruling and sided with CMS in a move that prevents hospitals from receiving Medicaid DSH payments to cover costs for which they have already been compensated by private insurers or Medicare.

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (NY) released a rural health plan Wednesday (Aug. 7) that calls for expanding long-term services and supports (LTSS), but otherwise echoes the calls of other Democratic presidential candidates for more Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement and telehealth services as candidates increasingly focus on rural health in their presidential bids.