[excited2adoptsoon]

I've heard conflicting answers on this. Can my fosterchild keep her medi-cal after we finalize an adoption? If so, can we still add her on our private insurance? It seems that would be ideal as our private insurance is much better, but the medi-cal would allow her to receive WIC and it could be used as a backup insurance in case of emergency. Is this a possibility?

I'm in Los Angeles by the way.

[carlychan]

Once adopted, your kids will keep their Medi-cal. I think you can choose to use your own insurance. I am hoping we will be able to use our military insurance with the kids with medi-cal as a backup. The wic office also told me that the kids will still be eligiable after adoption if they still have their medical.

[excited2adoptsoon]

thank you! I hope we can continue it. The medi-cal website is a little vague with fosterchild/adoption cases. It says "they may qualify". But I'm sure my adoption worker already mentioned she'll continue to receive it since she is considered special needs (since she was exposed to drugs).

I've heard from a few people that they try to take the medi-cal away and some people have to fight for it. I'd love to hear if anyone actually kept it, post adoption.

[DannieAS]

what I was told was that medi-cal is primary until finalization and then it will be secondary to your insurance...there are some things that medi-cal can continue to pick up depending on what is needed....specifically in the mental health world.

[DianeS]

Medical coverage is typically addressed in the subsidy agreement. You may have to fight for it, your caseworker may have to fight for it. With the current budget cuts, subsidies of any kind are harder to get, and when someone gets one it may be smaller than that same child may have qualified for a couple years ago.

Lots of things can be addressed in the subsidy agreement - medical coverage, monthly stipend, residential treatment, college costs, whether or not any of those things can be adjusted in the future if the child's needs change, and so on.

Being able to prove your child meets your state's definition of "special needs" is the first hurdle. Then making your case for how much assistance the child will need - above and beyond what a non-special needs child would require.

In some states/counties/agencies you get a good subsidy package almost automatically. In others, you have to make a case for it and a committee/person decides if you qualify and for how much of what you asked for. And in others, it's harder than that because they're being really stingy with subsidy agreements.

Hope that helps!

[dachshunds4you]

As for WIC, we did not qualify once she was adopted...and this was in CA. They originally said if she still had medi-cal they would accept her, but once it came down to it, they were going based on our income, so we did not qualify. I've ran into the same situation in TX.

Just our experience.

[julierose24]

I am in San Bernardino County. Our daughter's adoption was finalized in April of 2007. She still has medi cal, and will until she turns 18. We actually switched it to IEHP so that we can assign her doctor as kaiser. that way she goes to the same place we do (our insurance is Kaiser), but she is not on our insurance in any way. She has no co pays at all, and we do - so her insurance is actually better than ours.

Hope this helps.

Julie

p.s. it was not easy to switch over to IEHP, lots of red tape and it took time, but as with anything county, be persistent and it will work out.

[mommytoEli]

we also kept the straight medi-cal. for years we used it as secondary at kaiser. it was fabulous to not have to pay copays for sick children. we recently moved, and were surprised to learn that it could come with us afterall. that is something i need to work on. what i like about it is knowing that if my life fell apart and we had no insurance as a family, the kids would be cared for immediately. the one thing to keep in mind is that you tell medi-cal when you add your child onto your insurance. you can not use medi-cal as the primary if you have the child on your private insurance. medi-cal will find out, and they will bill you for any services that were rendered. i learned that one the hard way(i didn't know before)......$400 later i know how it works now. lol.

[sgtfirstwife]

We are military family that has adopted and are in the process of adopting two more (fingers crossed). My son that is adopted still has his med-cal card and will have it until he is 18 years old. He also receives WIC. Our two that we are about to adopt (one has special needs) also will keep there med-cal and wic. We did not have to ask for it or anything. Our adoption worker just told us he would get it. The med-cal is a secondary to Tricare. Makes a nice little back up for my children.

[DannieAS]

Originally Posted by mommytoEli

we also kept the straight medi-cal. for years we used it as secondary at kaiser. it was fabulous to not have to pay copays for sick children.

My insurance is Kaiser....what do you mean exactly when you used it as secondary to Kaiser...that it could be used so you don't have to pay the co-pay?????? I'm sure I'll have these questions to ask my cw, but just thought I'd ask

[mommytoEli]

Originally Posted by DannieAS

My insurance is Kaiser....what do you mean exactly when you used it as secondary to Kaiser...that it could be used so you don't have to pay the co-pay?????? I'm sure I'll have these questions to ask my cw, but just thought I'd ask

ahhh...this is fabulous really. once your child is adopted and you have added them to kaiser.....when you check in at the front desk, and they swipe your kaiser card and say. "that'll be 15 dollars." or whatever your co pay is, you then hand them your child's medi-cal card, they swipe that as the co pay. you pay nothing. medi-cal picks up the co pay. the same goes for hospital stays or surgeries and most medication. i had problems with this about 10% of the time....as most medi-cal patients they deal with are medi-cal patients first, and have kaiser as their medi-cal provider. but we are different. we have kaiser first, with a medi-cal secondary. so they may ask you to call a kaiser office and tell them you need to "link" your medi-cal to your kaiser. those people are wrong. there is nothing for you to do at all other than hand the card over at each visit. it took me a while to learn this from kaiser team members who had btdt. the only out of pocket expenses you should then incur are for some medicines that medi-cal doesn't cover....you would then use kaiser only and have a co pay. the pharmacies are good about checking, but it does take them about 15-20 minutes to do so.....so it isn't helpful if you are in a hurry.

[Angelnetty]

Ohh I didn't think about the medi-cal covering the copays that the primary insurance charges. I was more interested in having both because I've heard that covering mental health can be quite expensive and not completely covered by most private insurances!! Thanks again mommytoeli!!

[mommytoEli]

Originally Posted by Angelnetty

Ohh I didn't think about the medi-cal covering the copays that the primary insurance charges. I was more interested in having both because I've heard that covering mental health can be quite expensive and not completely covered by most private insurances!! Thanks again mommytoeli!!

yeah,i could not use my medi-cal to cover my dd's mental health co pay through kaiser. i never did figure out why. but for me, the care we got at kaiser was better than any mental health care we could get that did take medi-cal, so i just sucked it up and paid. but i kind of thought of it like i saved so much money on co pays for other visits and meds, that i could handle the 15 dollar co pay for mental health visits. kwim?