My daughter is very ...

My daughter is very ill suffering the effects of morbid obesity. Katie was on medicaid and I was able to find a Doctor as well as a hospital in florida to cover her appointments and surgery we were half way there. On the 30th of April medicaid cancelled her, she has aged out of their guidelines, as long as she lives with me and my husband she is not eligable to be covered. I have contacted the Governor Crist's office for help, they cannot do anything to help my daughter.Department of Children and families has informed me that even though my husband is a disabled veteran living on a fixed income from his disability, Katie cannot work, our income is over the guidlines. The catch 22 is she is to old to be considered a child and cannot apply on her own unless she does not live in my home. I asked if they thought I shoud toss her out it may be the only way to get her the help she needs. I was informed they were not advising that but I needed to do what I needed to do. I think our Goverment needs to recognize the epidemic that is growing here and the fact that there are no services in place to address it. I would like for all overweight people to contact me if you have been hitting a brick wall, possibly if everyone banded together and contacted our legislators or maybe met in Tallahassee we could change this. Please contact me if you have any Ideas. [email protected] Thanks

Contact the OAC - the Obesity Action Coalition, Here is there website - They might be of some help. http://www.obesityaction.org/home/index.php

Try Voc Rehab

Can your daughter apply for SSI or social security disability? The problem here is not that WLS is not available -- the problem is that your daughter no longer meets the criteria for medicaid. You did not mention the specific disability that your daughter has or how old she is but is it of a nature that she might could live in some sort of group home, or assisted living facility -- at least until she gets her surgery and gets on better footing medically. Red

Hi Patti, Our office (US Bariatric Orlando) has tremendous success with the United Healthcare Medicaid product. They are covering 100% of surgeon, hospital, anesthesia, psych eval, and first year of office followup. HTH, Kristen