Oklahoma Medicaid Program Ranks Low

Wednesday, April 18th 2007, 2:37 pm

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- Oklahoma's Medicaid program ranks low in a report from a national consumer advocacy group. Washington-based Public Citizen Health Research Group ranks Oklahoma 47th in the nation due to the range of Medicaid services offered, the quality of car and the reimbursement levels for doctors.

Of 1,000 possible points, the state earned 336.7. The highest score is 645.9 by
Massachusetts.

Public Citizen director Sidney Wolfe says Medicaid is a problem in all states because of poor funding, a lack of doctors who'll treat Medicaid patients and inconsistencies in the programs from state to state.

Medicaid was established more than 40 years ago to help low-income people get health care and is partially funded by individual states -- leading to a wide variations in benefits and programs in each state.