Medicaid Approved, yes? No?...Yes? No?....Yes!

I realized a few weeks ago that I had not updated you on Mike's Medicaid process, but forgot to write about it. Was just as well, since it's been a bit dragged out.

On the 24th of August, I received a letter stating that Mike had been approved. That seemed really fast compared to what everyone had told me. I guess when you don't have much, it goes fairly quickly...or so I thought. As soon as I received the letter, I started calling all the places that were waiting for payment and soon discovered that when they input his Medicaid number it said he did not have benefits.

I contacted his case worker and she discovered that his Social Security number had been keyed in incorrectly. She quickly corrected that, but then it said there was a duplicate. Evidently when I had started the process four years ago, a number was generated even though I did not pursue it to completion. When his Social was put in incorrectly, it did not register that there was already a number in the system under his name, so generated a new number. Now that the case manager fixed the Social number, it said there were two records for Mike. This was an issue that our case manager could not correct. She had to send it to the state level and thought it should be corrected in a couple of days. I called every couple of weeks to see if it was straight. No.

The end of September, I received Mike's Medicaid card in the mail. I called our case manager and she said it was OK now, so I started calling everyone we owed money and again was informed that the system said he was not covered. So much time spent holding on the phone and nothing accomplished. Frustrating. Called case manager back, voice mail, she didn't return my call. Waited a few days and asked Appomattox Health & Rehab to try the number again and this time it worked!! Praise God! So, last week I was able to call all of the billing departments and everyone was able to see Mike in the system this time and would submit his bills to Medicaid. I was so glad to check that off my mental list. I really don't like having unpaid bills going past due.

I saw Mike on Monday and it was almost like last Thursday never happened. He did not talk at all. With help from the PT aide, we did walk with him down the hall, but he would not walk with just me. Once I was able to get him to stand, but then he sat right back down. Later, he wouldn't budge from his wheelchair. Mr. B. wasn't feeling well and there was a lot of sickness going through the facility, so they kept everyone in their rooms during meals. Maybe he wasn't feeling well either. He wasn't agitated, simply omming and sitting. The podiatrist was there and worked Mike into his schedule and Mike did let me clip his fingernails. That was about it.

Thank you for your comments and praising God with me that Mike did so well last week. I expect we'll see more of that off and on.

Please pray for my Mom, she has not been feeling well and no one can pinpoint the problem, so far. We have a couple of doctor appointments for her in the next week and really hope one of them will find some answers that will help her feel better. Thank you for partnering with us in prayer for God's wisdom for the doctors. God is Awesome and the master physician - there is nothing He doesn't know!