N.Y. seeking Medicaid waiver; Calif. adult services lawsuit now 'unsettled'

A selection of Medicaid news.

Reuters: NY Eyes $18 Bln Of Medicaid Savings To Be Split With U.S.
New York plans to overhaul the nation's most expensive Medicaid health care system to save $18.3 billion over five years, and will ask the federal government for half of those savings. ... By the end of 2012, the state plans to ask the federal government to give it a waiver that will let it run the program more flexibly. ... Much of the savings would be achieved by switching to managed care (Gralla, 3/23).

California Healthline: Advocates File Contempt Motion Against State
Disability Rights California, which filed and then settled a lawsuit challenging the transition of adult day health care by the Department of Health Care Services, now has filed a contempt motion saying that DHCS officials have not been following the terms of the agreement. That settlement prompted the state's creation of the Community Based Adult Services program, due to launch Sunday, the day after ADHC is eliminated as a Medi-Cal benefit (Gorn, 3/26). 

Reuters: Texas, Johnson & Johnson Heading Back To Court
Representatives of Johnson & Johnson and the state of Texas will head back to court on Tuesday over a $158 million settlement agreement announced in January involving the drug Risperdal, a spokesman for Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said on Sunday. ... [The settlement] -- the largest Medicaid fraud recovery ever in Texas -- was specific to the Lone Star State (MacLaggan, 3/25). 

Kaiser Health News: Capsules: Feds To Test Paying For Medicaid Patients With Psychiatric Emergencies
A group of states is testing whether Medicaid patients who seek emergency psychiatric care at private psychiatric hospitals are better off if the federal government picks up part of the costs. Right now, the federal government does not help states pay for inpatient psychiatric care for many Medicaid patients-;a longstanding policy meant to discourage states from cost-shifting to the federal government and institutionalizing patients (Barr, 3/23).