Medi-Cal: Blood lead screening tests.

Existing law provides for the Medi-Cal program, which is administered by the State Department of Health Care Services, under which qualified low-income individuals receive health care services. The Medi-Cal program is, in part, governed and funded by federal Medicaid program provisions. Existing law authorizes the department to enter contracts with managed care plans to provide Medi-Cal services. Under existing law, Medi-Cal covers early and periodic screening, diagnostic, and treatment services for individuals under 21 years of age, consistent with federal law. This bill would require any contract between the department and a Medi-Cal managed care plan to impose requirements on the Medi-Cal managed care plan to identify every enrollee who does not have a record of completing those tests at 12 and 24 months of age, and to remind the contracting health care provider who is responsible for performing a periodic health assessment of a child of the need to perform those tests. The bill would require the department to develop and implement procedures, and take enforcement action, as prescribed, to ensure that a Medi-Cal managed care plan performs those duties. If a Medi-Cal managed care plan enrollee who is a child misses a required blood lead screening test at 12 and 24 months of age, the bill would require the Medi-Cal managed care plan to notify specified individuals responsible for that child, including the parent or guardian, about those missed blood lead screening tests, and would require that notification to be included as part of an annual notification on preventive services.