Webinar

WIP CEU Webinar Series: Special Medicaid Eligibles: CDBs, DWBs and a Pickle on Top

$20

Medicaid is the most important benefit that many people we serve will ever receive.  It provides comprehensive medical coverage and can supplement other health insurance.  Most importantly, it can cover a variety of disability-related services that other insurance rarely if ever covers (or covers adequately), such as home and community-based services, attendant care and community behavioral health services.  Many people are willing to give up SSI, if they’ll be financially better off without it, but only if they won’t lose Medicaid.

 

Luckily, SSA rules protect Medicaid for certain groups of former SSI recipients who have switched to receiving certain Title II benefits.  Often referred to as “special Medicaid eligible”, they include people whose SSI has stopped due to receipt of Childhood Disability Benefits (CDB, also known as Disabled Adult Child (DAC) benefits) and those whose SSI has stopped when they receive Disabled Widow’s/Widower’s Benefits (DWB).  A third – and widely misunderstood – group have lost SSI for any reason, receive Title II benefits now, and would still receive SSI if they had not received Title II cost of living increases after their SSI payments stopped.  These folks benefit from the Pickle Amendment and are commonly known (God help them) as “Pickle people”.

 

This training explains eligibility for each of the three groups, how eligibility is determined, how to ensure a person can get or keep Medicaid if they belong to one of these groups, how some people who lose special Medicaid eligibility may regain it later, and the role of a WIP in helping people qualify for special Medicaid eligibility.