CAT Board holds final meeting of FY20

The Catastrophic Health Care Program board of directors held its final meeting of the fiscal year this week. The meeting caseload eclipsed all other meetings this fiscal year with 159 cases for the board to review. The board approved over $3 million in claims to be paid.   No evidence of a slow down due to Medicaid expansion at the CAT level yet. 

“We know the counties are seeing a reduction in caseload but so far it’s business as usual at the CAT fund program office,” said Kathryn Mooney, Catastrophic Health Care Program Director. 

The board was reminded at the meeting the appropriation for the state fiscal 2021, beginning July 1^st was only $3,500,600. That combined with reimbursements of about $3 million adds up to ‘not much’.  Kathryn told the board she’s been in contact with some counties and they are reviewing suspended cases and dealing with backlog now that they have some time to do that, adding to the CAT caseload.

Chair Roger Christensen, said, “We’ll just have to wait and see how far the money goes and will likely have to ask the legislature for a supplement during the session in January.”