Medicare is a program designed to support those who cannot afford health insurance and who are over sixty-five years old. However, there is one exception to this rule. People who have end-stage renal disease are eligible for Medicare notwithstanding the age (“End-stage renal disease,” 2013). I find this fact rather strange. Firstly, I do not understand why Medicare program contradicts its basic rule, which is providing aid for the people pertaining to a certain age group.
If the government sets this age barrier, it should take care of keeping up with their own regulations. There is no explanation of why Medicare has an age limit for all illnesses with the only exception of end-stage renal disease. Secondly, there are other illnesses which require a lot of care and expenses, but they are not included in Medicare coverage. In the meantime, people with end-stage renal disease receive a long-term support which can be resumed after the period when it is not needed without any additional requests or waiting periods.
I do not intend to say that people with end-stage renal disease do not deserve support. They indeed might need it more than other people. The disease is life-threatening, and those who suffer from it do require additional aid. However, there should be a separate regulation for the assistance which such people can expect to receive. There are many serious illnesses apart from end-stage renal disease which require a special status. However, they are not included in the Medicare program, which makes the situation look rather unfair. I think the government should create a separate program for people with end-stage renal disease not to make others confused by Medicare regulations and exceptions from them.
The EPSDT Program and Access to Dentistry Services
I agree with the author’s opinion that Medicaid is a beneficial program for children from low-income families which allows them to receive the necessary healthcare support. I, too, am of the opinion that there are some limitations to the Early Periodic Screening, Diagnosis, and Treatment (EPSDT) program designed for children and young people under the age of twenty-one (Peters, 2006). The EPSDT was implemented as a subdivision of Medicaid with the aim of the enhancement of children’s access to quality healthcare services (Peters, 2006). However, the program’s functioning is not as optimistic as its prospects were in the initiation phase.
For instance, there are huge difficulties concerned with the EPSDT participants’ access to dentistry care. The states are supposed to provide dental screenings for children, but they frequently fail to fulfill this requirement. It is often the case that a state may have its own schedule for such screenings, and not all children manage to receive timely assistance. Moreover, research shows that the majority of children eligible for Medicaid do not get any EPSDT services (Peters, 2006).
EPSDT was intended to pursue a noble aim of providing healthcare support for Medicare children, but its actual implementation met some serious obstacles. On the part of dentists, these limitations are caused by the uncertainty of which services are actually covered by the program. In general, the program presents challenges not only to dentists but all healthcare specialists. The core disadvantage is in EPSDT being rather complicated. Other limitations are concerned with the insufficient data about the program participants, restricted family understanding, unclear care organization, and state administrative confrontations.
References
End-stage renal disease (ESRD). (2013). Web.
Peters, C. (2006). EPSDT: Medicaid’s critical but controversial benefits program for children. Issue Brief (George Washington University. National Health Policy Forum, 819, 1-24.