Kansas Health

[Dave Ranney and Mike Shields, "Kansas must repay $18.5M for Medicaid misspending," The Lawrence Journal-World, 30 June 2006.]

Medicaid spending in Kansas is on a crash course as it is. Now that federal authorities are following through on their efforts to ensure states are not engaging in questionable accounting practices that over-bill the federal government, however, serious questions should arise about the program's financial stability:

Kansas has agreed to repay another $18.5 million to the U.S. government after auditors found the state misspent money from the federal Medicaid program.

That makes $32.6 million the state has agreed to pay back this year. And the refund tally could grow, given that $135 million in federal aid has been under review.

An audit report released in February examined how Kansas billed Medicaid to pay for services for children with special needs. Investigators said a sample of 300 Medicaid claims from three school districts — Wichita, Kansas City and the Central Kansas Cooperative — in 2002 turned up 217 claims that shouldn’t have been paid:

- Seventy-six claims lacked a required doctor’s order for occupation and speech-language therapy services.

- One hundred thirty-nine claims lacked evidence that services had ever been rendered.

- Two claims lacked a required doctor’s order for physical therapy.

According to the audit report to be released today, “Kansas did not have adequate internal controls to ensure that it correctly developed the payment rate” for services.

Bilking the feds out of cash was just another way to shove the growing Medicaid problem under the rug. With the federal government on to the scheme, however, the urgency of addressing fundamental flaws within the program increases dramatically.

[Michael Bond, "What Is Wrong with Medicaid in Kansas?," The Flint Hills Center, 26 December 2005.
Michael Bond, "Reforming Medicaid in Kansas: A Market-Based Approach," The Flint Hills Center, 2 February 2006.]