Newspaper Series Leads to Committee Hearings

NEWSPAPER SERIES LEADS TO COMMITTEE HEARINGS

Two House committee hearings were held in June following a five-part series in the Dallas Morning News highlighting issues with Medicaid Managed Care in Texas.

Entitled Pain and Profit, the series described the failure of the state’s managed care organizations (MCOs) to provide care for many vulnerable Texans who rely on Medicaid for their care. Specific examples were given in the pieces, which ran in early June, of patients who had suffered when their services were reduced or eliminated following the rollout of Medicaid managed care.

Each of those articles can be read at the links below:

1) ‘Tragedy of D’ashon Morris’ https://interactives.dallasnews.com/2018/pain-and-profit/part1.html …

2) Systemic denials https://interactives.dallasnews.com/2018/pain-and-profit/part2.html …

3)’Sham’ networks https://interactives.dallasnews.com/2018/pain-and-profit/part3.html …

4) TX Officials hide the ‘horror’ https://interactives.dallasnews.com/2018/pain-and-profit/part4.html …

5) The #txlege Machine https://interactives.dallasnews.com/2018/pain-and-profit/part5.html … #PainandProfit

On June 20, the House Human Services Committee held a hearing with the intent of digging deeper into the issues. MCO representatives challenged the accuracy of many of the claims made in the series in their testimony before the committee. Only invited testimony was taken at the hearing.

One week later, a joint hearing of the House General Investigating and Ethics Committee and the House Appropriations Article II Subcommittee was held. Public testimony was taken at this hearing. The members questioned agency oversight of the MCOs during a hearing that lasted more than 15 hours.

Although long term care was not included in the series, it could be impacted by changes made by the Legislature or agency in other areas of Medicaid managed care.