When the Brown administration decided to save the state some money and transfer 860,000 low-income children from the successful and admired Healthy Families program to HMOs participating in Medi-Cal, health care advocates feared that it would prove to be a wrenching experience that would provide a lower level of service to vulnerable patients.

The transition is supposed to begin January 1, but the preliminaries got off to a rocky start for 2,600 families last week. ID cards that include the recipient’s name, date of birth and gender were mailed to the wrong families by the Department of Health Care Services.

The snafu was blamed on a computer error.

The department said there was little danger of identity theft or fraud, sent the recipients a stamped, self-addressed envelope and asked that they mail the ID cards back to the state. Officials announced the department would hire an outside firm to assess its security policies, while conducting its own review of how data is handled.

That may be cold comfort to the thousands of families and their advocates who fought hard against the switch from Healthy Families. Back in June, California Coverage and Health Initiatives Executive Director Suzie Shupe warned, “Medi-Cal already has significant access problems that have yet to be addressed. So putting so many additional children into that program is just inviting serious problems for those kids.”

Advocates have said their main concern in the transition is provider access. “We have said consistently that the state isn't quite ready yet,” Wendy Lazarus, founder of The Children’s Partnership, said earlier in the month.  

The first phase of the transition, which begins after the first of the year, is scheduled to move about 415,000 children into Medi-Cal. Phase Two begins April 1.

–Ken Broder

To Learn More: 

State Agency Mails 2,600 Medi-Cal Cards to Wrong Families (by Ashley Powers, Los Angeles Times)

Healthy Families Set for January Transition (by David Gorn, California Healthline)

Kids Following Tortuous Path to Managed Care Blazed by Poor Seniors and Disabled (by Ken Broder, AllGov California)