1. Kids Health Insurance Week Our official kickoff is August 8 but preliminary events and media coverage are underway. We are combining a statewide marketing campaign with media outreach activities. The best information source is our web site with a special button linking you to a list of all the excitement. TOGETHER=100%...please help spread the word to families of eligible uninsured kids so all of Hawaii's children and youth have health insurance! 2. SUPER Clinics Provide Health Insurance Information During a back-to-school push, Nebraska's Kids Connection participated in Selecting Ultra-Healthy Practices for Effective Results (SUPER) clinics at three different locations that offered physicals, well-child checkups, WIC services, immunizations, lead screening, and Kids Connection enrollment. The checkups were provided by a family nurse practitioner through a Maternal and Child Health (MCH) grant. Most services at the clinic are free. The SUPER Clinics gave families with potentially eligible, uninsured children information about Kids Connection and Medicaid. For more information, please contact Amy Doescher with Goldenrod Hills Community Services, a Covering Kids pilot project at 402.529.3513, x 15 or kc@gpcom.net. 3. Summer "Sign Them Up" Newsletter The Children's Defense Fund's Child Health Implementation Project released the summer edition of its "Sign Them Up" newsletter online. This edition focuses on access to health care services for children enrolled in Medicaid and the CHIP. Some of the articles include: * Roundin' Up the Uninsured in the Frontier States * Denali Kidcare: Renewal Made Easy * "Carefree" Adolescents: Most in Need of Health Care Services * Smile Alabama * The Act to Leave No Child Behind 4. Hot Off the Press from The Urban Institute a. "Why Aren't More Uninsured Children Enrolled in Medicaid or CHIP?" by Genevieve Kenney and Jennifer Haley; Policy Brief B-35; May 2001 Although most uninsured children appear to be eligible for public health insurance coverage, parents interviewed in the 1999 National Survey of America's Families give a variety of reasons for not enrolling their children in public health insurance programs. Among the reasons: insufficient knowledge about the programs (32 percent); administrative hassles associated with enrollment (10 percent); not wanting public insurance for their children or feeling such insurance is not needed (22 percent). This leads researchers to question whether the current emphasis on education and outreach is sufficient to increase program participation. http://www.urban.org/url.cfm?ID=310217. b. "How Familiar Are Low-Income Parents with Medicaid and CHIP?" by Genevieve Kenney, Jennifer Haley, and Lisa Dubay; Policy Brief B-34; May 2001 Although 88 percent of low-income uninsured children have parents who have heard of Medicaid or CHIP, data from the 1999 National Survey of America's Families show that only 38 percent also know that children can participate even if the family is not receiving welfare. Familiarity with these programs among low-income families varies significantly by state. Among the 13 states studied, 41 percent of low-income families had heard of Medicaid or CHIP and understood their eligibility rules in Texas, compared to 71 percent in Massachusetts. Low-income parents tended to be more knowledgeable in states that implemented CHIP early and in states that have higher levels of public coverage. http://newfederalism.urban.org/html/series_b/b34/b34.html. c. "Has the Jury Reached a Verdict? States' Early Experiences with Crowd Out Under CHIP" by Amy Westphal Lutzky and Ian Hill; Occasional Paper 47; May 2000 This report analyzes 18 states' experiences implementing policies to limit crowd out--the substitution of publicly-sponsored health insurance for private coverage. Interviews with governments officials, providers, and advocates reveal that 11 states adopted a relatively aggressive approach to limit crowd out such as waiting periods during which children must be uninsured before being permitted to enroll in CHIP. Although waiting periods have been criticized as imposing an enrollment barrier, several states include waiting period exceptions that permit families with very expensive coverage or with children with special health care needs to immediately enroll in CHIP. Monitoring and using application questions to inquire about health insurance status were also commonly used crowd out prevention policies. http://www.urban.org/url.cfm?ID=310218 d. "Are We Responding to Their Needs? States' Early Experiences Serving Children with Special Health Care Needs under CHIP" by Ian Hill and Amy Westphal Lutzky (The Urban Institute) and Renee Schwalberg (Health Systems Research, Inc.); Occasional Paper 48; June 2001 CHIP appears to be providing broad, affordable coverage to low-income children with special health care needs (CSHCN). A significant number of states have designed special provisions to better meet the needs of CSHCN. The study, based on interviews with government officials, providers, and advocates in 18 states, also found that CSHCN may be disproportionately affected by enrollment waiting periods designed to prevent "crowd out." Waiting periods preclude families from switching their children's private coverage to CHIP even if that coverage is very limited and/or expensive. The authors suggest changes to permit CHIP to wrap around existing private coverage or exempt CSHCN from waiting period policies. http://www.urban.org/url.cfm?ID=310286