MODESTO BEE
ORIGINAL ARTICLE

By KEN CARLSON
BEE STAFF WRITER

Last Updated: December 23, 2005, 04:22:58 AM PST

Everyone from health advocates to government auditors are predicting problems when about 1 million Medi-Cal beneficiaries start receiving drug benefits in January through the Medicare program.
The state's Medi-Cal program wants to give people a safety net — the option of obtaining 100-day supplies of medicines during the transition.

Medi-Cal will pay for the drugs if beneficiaries get prescriptions from their doctors and the prescriptions are filled before Jan. 1, officials said.

Some elderly and disabled people qualify for Medi-Cal and Medicare and have received medicine through Medi-Cal in the past. But now, the federal government is assigning them to Medicareapproved private drug plans.

It's feared some people will be lost in computer glitches and others soon will discover that their private plans do not cover their medications.

Frank Dotson, director of the Health Insurance Advocacy and Counseling Program in Stanislaus County, said people are allowed to drop their assigned plan and choose another one.

"If they get a prescription for 100 days, it will give them three months to make sure they have a plan that works for them," he said.

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