Medicaid question

I had to take a letter stating that the agency in Texas had conservatorship over my daughter but that she was now living in the State of Michigan. This gave her a medicaid card covering everything the state of Michigan pays for in her birth name. Once her adoption became final I had to goto Social Security and stop her SSI and her subsidy started with her medicaid now being in her adopted name.

We are adopting out of state too. We live in Texas and the children are in Nebraska. We do NOT get Texas Medicaid. The children get Nebraska Medicaid!! This means we have to go to each provider and ask if they are willing to sign up for NE medicaid! Needless to say this is a big hassle! Luckily we have United Healthcare insurance and this insurance will cover the children as soon as they enter our home! (before adoption is final). We still want therapists, etc. who are willing to take NE medicaid so we can use it as a secondary insurance. For example, our insurance only covers 30 mental health visits a year and our children currently see a therapist 1 to 2x a week! Also our insurance does not cover dental (that's under my name and my dental insurance will NOT cover the children till the adoption is final). This is all a huge mess and hassle and I can't believe they won't just switch it. Because of our income we do not qualify for Medicaid on our own. However, NE is also willing to take all of this into account when they negotiate our subsidies so we'll probably end up getting a higher amount. Our sibling group are 11 and 13 with many special needs (more mental than health). We get them on Nov. 11 and we're still trying to get all this therapy and stuff in place. Good luck!Mary

When the children move into your house you take their medicaid and have it changed to Texas medicaid. If they aren't living with you but with foster parents then they would continue to have their out of state medicaid until the day they move out of that state.

Some states have reciprocity and when the adoption is final you automatically switch to that state's Medicaid. Texas (where I live) is one of those states. However Nebraska (where my children are from) is not! IPCAC I think is the initials for it. This means our children have NE Medicaid until the adoption is final. We were assured though that when our children's adoptions were final that we would have Texas Medicaid (which we will) and that we would have Nebraska Medicaid as a backup. We found out 5 days before our daughter's finalization date that we would not have NE Medicaid as a backup! This was HUGE to us since TX pays for VERY little and has almost no RTC care. Nebraska covers up to 18 months in RTC (at the time our son had been in RTC for 5 months already and odds are pretty good he'll need it again!). Also, NE post adoption services are built into their Medicaid. TX provides those separately. Since our kids are out of state - they do not qualify for these state-funded post adoption services! NE has said that we get TX Medicaid and that should be enough! We've tried explaining the difference. NE has finally said they will give us the RTC subsidy, if we can prove that we've exhausted all other alternatives. We're at our wits end. To think, we thought we were LUCKY because we had kids from out of state and therefore were going to get better services. The only thing we knew we were missing out on was that TX provides in-state college tuition. Marymom to D(14), C(12), K(11) and T(8)*sigh*

Again, it truly amazes me how DHS personnel can tell you all the 'BS' they think you need to hear, but in the end no one works with you. This has always been a pet peeve with how our government treats our kids and foster parents.... it's a real shame.

In my own experience dealing with Arkansas....it is a mess, unless you get the right person to help. Go directly to the district manager. Case workers do not know the answers to out of state transfers. According to Arkansas there are only two states that do not recognize out of state medicaid transfer, but they did not know which ones. The out of state transfer is referred to as ICAMA. The district manager can work directly with your state case worker or manager and at least get you a medicaid number before your card arrives. This is from my own experience. After numerous phone calls and wasted time dealing with menu systems I found it less painful and more productive to at least email the district manager and then follow up with a phone call. Good luck !