Access to Care for Disabled Children Under Medicaid

This article examines differences in access and use of care among children on Medicaid with physical disabilities, mental illness, and mental retardation/development disabilities (MR/DD) in New York City (NYC). We use 1999 and 2000 survey data obtained from the parents of a random sample of disabled children on Medicaid to conduct both descriptive and multivariate analyses. We find that the Medicaid Program has been successful at linking disabled children to health care providers. However, there is evidence of greater access problems for some subgroups of disabled children. Improving access for disabled children under the Medicaid Program will require targeted help to specific groups of children.