The Shriver Brief : Poverty Law Commentary & Insights : Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law : Affordable Housing, Healthcare Reform

Investing in our children is investing in Illinois. When we help children grow and thrive, we are paving the way for our state’s next generation of healthy workers and leaders. Investing in our children means investing in their health through All Kids--Illinois’ nationally renowned health insurance program. Ensuring that every Illinois child has access to health insurance allows children to grow into healthy, productive adults. And we know that our investment is paying off because of the “All Kids Final Report”--a recently released study of the All Kids program. The Covering All Kids Health Insurance Act mandated the study, and it was conducted by the Health Evaluation Collaborative and Institute for Health Research and Policy at University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health. 

The study aimed to measure the progress of the All Kids program in insuring children as well as examine areas for improvement. The study showed that the All Kids program has been hugely successful in helping to cover Illinois’ uninsured children: more than nine out of every ten Illinois children have health insurance coverage—many through the All Kids program or a parent’s workplace. While an overwhelming majority of the children who are eligible for employer-sponsored coverage were enrolled in that coverage, that is not an option afforded to all. Luckily, All Kids is there to catch those kids whose families cannot afford or do not have the choice of employer-sponsored coverage so their families have one less thing to worry about during these difficult economic times.

Since All Kids was first offered, the rate of uninsured children has dropped dramatically. At the beginning of the All Kids program, one out of every five low-income children were uninsured, but today, that number is down to approximately one in twenty low-income children. The majority of this enrollment growth since All Kids became available to all uninsured children is among children who were already eligible before the program was expanded. Children are the least expensive population to insure, and the investment now in their health will pay back in dividends later. Research shows that individuals with access to health care as children are less likely to have chronic health problems as adults.  

The recently released study also showed that children in All Kids were significantly more likely to have received an annual check-up and to have seen a dentist in the last 12 months than uninsured children, which means that they received necessary vaccinations and illnesses could be caught early to allow for more time in the classroom. Parents of All Kids’ enrollees were also more likely to report that their child had a “medical home” than both parents of uninsured children and privately insured children, which means that the state of Illinois has been successful in connecting All Kids’ enrollees to a provider who knows the child's health history and can provide health care on a regular basis. These investments are crucial to ensure Illinois kids are ready to learn and on the right track to become healthy, productive young adults.

The study also highlighted areas for improvement, including connecting All Kids’ enrollees to the care they need. We need to ensure that All Kids enrollees can get appointments with specialty doctors when they need them and that providers and clinics offer expanded hours for working parents to take their children to their primary care provider. Overall, the study findings show that there is much to be proud of with the All Kids program: It is leading the way in covering kids, which benefits our entire state. Every child should be able to count on access to affordable, quality health insurance and care, and supporting the All Kids’ program isn’t just the right thing to do. It’s one of the best investments we can make as a state.

This article was co-authored by Kathy Chan, Associate Director, Illinois Maternal and Child Health Coalition.
 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

In the next several weeks kids throughout the state will head back to school. As summer vacation comes to a close, annual vaccinations and check-ups are often on the back-to-school to-do list of Illinois families. But for the estimated 148,000 uninsured children in Illinois, accessing these services can be a challenge. Fortunately, in Illinois this is a problem we can solve. In Illinois every uninsured child qualifies for Illinois’ public health insurance program: All Kids. For kids whose families cannot afford or do not have the choice of employer-sponsored coverage, All Kids is there to catch them so their families have one less thing to worry about during these difficult economic times.

Health insurance coverage allows children to get the care they need so they can spend more days in the classroom. Healthy children can grow and thrive. And children who have access to care now are much more likely to grow into healthy, productive adults. In fact, a recent study found that children enrolled in All Kids were significantly more likely to have had a well-child visit in the last year than uninsured children. And parents of children enrolled in All Kids were significantly more likely to report that their children had a usual source of care than did parents of uninsured children. Enrolling every uninsured child in All Kids health insurance can ensure that children have access to care so they are ready for the first day of school, have eyeglasses so they can see the chalkboard, dental exams so they are not distracted by a toothache, and medications for childhood illnesses like asthma so they can run and play.

Check out the Shriver Center’s All Kids Enrollment Event Toolkit for resources and best practices for enrolling eligible children in All Kids. And be sure to take a look at the new resources from Cover the Uninsured on back-to-school efforts. Parents can enroll their children in All Kids online or find an All Kids Application Agent in their area who can assist with the application process. 

This article was coauthored by Carrie Gilbert.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

This May, the Illinois Auditor General released an audit of the Covering All Kids Insurance Act expansion population of the All Kids program, Illinois’ comprehensive and affordable health insurance program for all uninsured children, which benefited over 1.67 million kids in 2009 and has garnered bi-partisan support in the state General Assembly over the last several years. The Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law recently released a brief examining the scope of the audit and the conclusions made by the Auditor General. Instead of providing helpful information to Illinois legislators and citizens on the program’s expenditures of money and awards of contracts, as directed by the law authorizing the audit, it overreaches into policy issues beyond its legislative authority and unwisely recommends changes to the All Kids program that, if implemented, would contradict health policy experts and jeopardize billions of federal Medicaid match dollars. 

The legislative purpose of the audit was to monitor expenditures of money and awards of contracts under the program, not to evaluate public policy. However, the Auditor General chose to focus the overwhelming majority of his attention on the public policy behind the Covering All Kids Insurance Act (to cover all children) and the carefully researched administrative policies regarding enrollment and retention in the program that have been adopted by the Department of Healthcare and Family Services (DHFS). It is unclear why the Auditor General assumes that the General Assembly was inviting an audit of its own public policy choices, and by doing so, second guesses the implementation choices made by DHFS experts on these matters. Moreover, the requirement of an annual audit for a subset of a state Medicaid program is unusual, administratively costly, and not supported by any data or legislative finding. The Covering All Kids Insurance Act—which provides coverage to less than 6% of the total All Kids population—was unjustifiably singled out for this scrutiny.

The Auditor General’s critique of Illinois’ use of passive renewal and 12-month continuous eligibility, and his other recommended changes to the enrollment procedures contradict national health policy experts and federal health leaders. If implemented, these recommendations could result in eligible kids being dropped from coverage, leaving them less likely to receive treatment for chronic conditions such as diabetes and asthma, and more likely to have poorer health, greater rates of avoidable hospitalizations, higher mortality rates, delays in necessary care, and unfilled prescriptions. At the same time, many of these recommendations, if implemented, could jeopardize federal Medicaid match money under the maintenance of efforts requirements of the stimulus law and federal health reform--at a loss of billions of dollars for Illinois.

The audit spends much time complaining about the lack of documentation in case files differentiating the types of immigrant children covered by the program, because, according to the audit, the correct documentation would entitle the state to federal matching funds that Illinois would otherwise forego. However, the difference in documentation among immigrant children did not become relevant to federal financing until Congress passed CHIPRA in January 2009 allowing federal matching funds for certain immigrant children for the first time. The Auditor General paid insufficient attention to the fact that DHFS can retroactively obtain the documentation needed to maximize and claim these federal funds for the time period in question. Similarly, the Auditor General failed to mention that the expansion population of the Covering All Kids Insurance Act has been entirely paid for by offsetting spending reductions elsewhere in the state’s medical assistance programs, as intended by the General Assembly when it passed the law.

Hard working Illinois families know far too well today’s economic reality and the importance of their children’s health insurance. We owe Illinois families a complete, accurate picture of the All Kids program, including a thoughtful real-world analysis of how over 1.6 million Illinois children and their families would be affected by implementation of the auditor’s recommendations. The full brief on the All Kids program is available on the Shriver Center's website.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Every day organizations throughout the state of Illinois are actively enrolling children in the state’s comprehensive health insurance program called All Kids.  According to the All Kids website, All Kids Application Agents (AKAAs) are faith-based organizations, medical providers, unions, day care centers, local governments, and other community-based organizations that help families enroll in the state’s public health insurance programs. AKAAs provide families with the support and assistance they need to enroll in the state’s public health insurance programs. AKAAs are organizations and individuals that families trust, which is crucial in a process that asks families to provide personal information. 

Imagine how many kids AKAAs could enroll if brought together for a single, community-wide, well-publicized event. This was the thinking behind the 1,000 Healthy Kids Campaign undertaken by Resurrection Health Care in the summer of 2008. Families are often unaware of the state’s option for uninsured children. By partnering with organizations that families trust and getting the word out about the program and the event, the 1,000 Healthy Kids Campaign was able to enroll over 1,000 kids in All Kids in one day. 

The 1,000 Healthy Kids Campaign enlisted the help of community leaders to ensure that their event was a success. Involving people in the community who families already know and trust is a crucial part of a successful event. Rosemary Kaminski and Andrea Hernandez at the Laboure Outpatient Center at St. Joseph Hospital, which is part of the Resurrection Health Care network, enroll children everyday at the clinic, hold an annual health fair, and were a pivotal part of the 1,000 Healthy Kids Campaign. Kaminski says that the trust and reputation the clinic has goes a long way in getting families enrolled in All Kids, “We get referrals from our patients and they know we’re here…There is a big trust there.”

Those involved in the planning, preparation, and execution of the event said that seeing their hard work come to fruition on the day of the event made their work worth it. Julie Derrig, who was part of the team that planned the event and served as a field captain on the day of the event, recounts that by 8:30 a.m. families were already lining up to enroll their kids in All Kids. 

The 1,000 Healthy Kids Campaign event successfully enrolled over 1,000 kids, but equally important the campaign made the people of the City of Chicago aware of a wonderful program available to families. The effort equipped families with the information and tools to enroll their children in health insurance, even if they were not able to enroll on the day of the event. Although the event was Chicago-based, the event headquarters received phone calls from families in Lake County looking for information. Outreach and education around All Kids can be as important as enrolling people in the program. 

The success of the 1,000 Healthy Kids Campaign can serve as inspiration for other enrollment events. However, organizations and communities should not feel like an effort is futile unless they can enroll 1,000 kids. Every kid enrolled in All Kids is another kid who will have access to the health care they need and another kid who will be connected to a primary care doctor. Check out the Shriver Center’s All Kids Enrollment Event Toolkit for more information on executing an enrollment or outreach event in your community.

This post was coauthored by Carrie Gilbert.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks