Kris

[Guest guest]

Hi, Everyone....Kris....in Pa, every child with a disability is eligible

for Medical Access. We used that as a secondary insurance when DH was

working and had primary insurance. When Gareth turned 21 y/o, we choose to pay

the extra $100/month to keep him on our primary insurance and continue to

use the Access as a secondary insurance. We choose to go this route because

G has 8-10 different specialists, for one reason or another. Under MA, I

don't think he'd be able to keep all those specialists because many don't

take pts with just MA. Maybe I am wrong on that, but we don't want to

chance having him dropped by any one of his specialists. As for SSI, at age

18,

you can apply for that. It is not the same as SS for disability --

ie.....you are working, get some awful, chronic illness and can't work anymore.

Ironically, for yrs, G got only the minimum payment, but when I ask about

them raising it because of the extra $100 we were paying for his primary

insurance, then it did go up some. PA also has what is called the CHIP

program for ANY child whose parent can't/doesn't have medical insurance.

Take care, Everyone.

Margaretr