A report on the roll out of the state’s new public benefits program, UHIP, is damning. The message: the problems are worse than we thought.
Secretary of Health and Human Services Elizabeth Roberts has delivered her resignation over the botched rollout. New leadership is in place to – Governor Gina Raimondo hopes – get the system back on track.
But some health care providers remain skeptical change will come fast enough.
UHIP united decades old public service benefit systems into one technology platform. But the system’s rollout has been disastrous. Clients have waited weeks for benefits like food stamps. And health care providers have waited for payment as the system’s glitches get worked out. Nicholas Oliver heads an agency that represents home and hospice care providers. He’s skeptical Governor Gina Raimondo understands the gravity of their situation.
“Long term care providers have been carrying the state’s debt on providing care without reimbursements since last summer. As a result of that, these long term care providers, including the home care and hospice agencies that I represent have become financially fragile,” said Oliver.
Oliver says some clients who could use home or hospice care have been waiting for that care because their applications are pending. Also, the state laid off many of the staff that had helped process those applications. But Raimondo says the state will be recalling some of those staffers.
