KSHB 41 reporter Elyse Schoenig covers the cities of Shawnee and Mission. She also focuses on issues surrounding the cost of health care, saving for retirement and personal debt. Share your story idea with Elyse.
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A Lenexa, Kansas, mom of four children with disabilities is raising concerns about how President Trump's proposed budget bill could impact Medicaid services that her family relies on.
The latest draft of Trump's budget bill could affect Medicaid in various ways, all aimed at saving money in a system that proponents say contains waste, fraud and abuse.
Along with cuts to Medicaid are cuts to food aid programs and clean energy funding. President Trump has set a deadline of July 4 for the bill to reach his desk.
Missouri is among the states likely to face lower provider taxes, which could mean reduced payments to hospitals, potentially impacting enrollment. In Kansas, analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) indicates there would be lower state-directed payments to hospitals.
Ryan Jolly is a licensed nurse practitioner at the practice she owns, the Brain Family First Center. She specializes in psychiatric care and Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders for medically complex individuals.
Jolly said she sees the potential impact of Medicaid cuts in both personal and professional perspectives.
"Without Medicaid for my children, how would I work? How would I hold down a job and provide the kind of care my children need?" Jolly said.
Jolly is most concerned with the Home- and Community-Based Services (HCBS) program, which provides optional coverage under Medicaid. This program funds medical equipment and rotating at-home nurses for her children so they don't have to live in a hospital.
"My children require 24/7 eyes on care," she said. "It's not humanly possible for one person to provide that, and so we have nursing care that comes into our home and helps support that, the need that my children have."
As a healthcare provider, Jolly worries about her patients as well. Her clinic is one of the few in the area that accepts Medicaid.
"If that is a significant reduction in reimbursement, I may have to decide that I can't accept Medicaid anymore because it doesn't make business sense. Where do my patients go?" Jolly said.
With both her roles as a mother and healthcare provider, Jolly has the same question about what comes next, especially since she sees the need every day.
"The need remains the same," Jolly said.
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