KanCare Contracts Signed

By Mike Shields

KHI News Service
June 27, 2012

TOPEKA — Kansas officials today announced contract awards to three Medicaid managed care companies.

They also said the new KanCare program’s projected savings over five years would be $1 billion instead of the $850 million previously forecast.

The three winning companies are Amerigroup, UnitedHealthcare and Sunflower State Health Plan, a subsidiary of Centene. The unsuccessful bidders were WellCare and Coventry.

The contract awards have been anxiously anticipated by many of the state’s Medicaid service providers. The providers have been heavily courted by the competing managed care companies as they have vied to develop the provider networks they will need to serve the state’s 380,000 Medicaid clients.

Federal officials must approve the contracts, rates and a Medicaid waiver before the administration of Gov. Sam Brownback can implement the Medicaid makeover plan first announced last November.

Brownback officials have said they aim to launch the KanCare program on Jan. 1, pending the needed approvals and reviews certifying that the contractors are ready.

KanCare would shift virtually all of the state’s Medicaid enrollees into fixed-rate managed care plans. Currently, about 70 percent of the state’s Medicaid population is served by managed care organizations.

Watch this space for additional information as this story develops.