ROBERT PIERCE
• Leader & Times
Many in the Sunflower State believe Kansas faces an urgent need to protect and expand Medicaid, and recently, the Alliance for a Healthy Kansas found a creative way for Kansans to unite and raise their voices through art.
AHK recently hosted the first of five stops in communities across Kansas at Liberal’s Baker Arts Center in “Mapping the Gap,” an event combining the creation of art with public education and organizing for access to health care.
In Liberal and in other communities, participants engage in a hands-on textile art project designed to highlight the gaps in health care access in Kansas towns.
Each participant has or will contribute to the collective work and also a smaller piece to take home. This family-friendly event welcomes all ages and skill levels, with no artistic experience necessary.
AHK Executive Director April Holman said the alliance is trying to educate people and increase awareness for the opportunity taking place in Kansas to expand eligibility for Medicaid and get more people covered and about the importance of trying to protect from having more cuts to the Medicaid program at the federal level.
In late May, the U.S. House voted to dramatically cut Medicaid, the most it has been cut in history, but Holman said the cut had not been completed at that point.
“We’re hoping on the Senate side, they will protect the people of Kansas and across the country who are utilizing the Medicaid program,” she said.
Holman said AHK is always looking for new ways to reach people across the state, and the idea for “Mapping the Gap” came from something alliance community organizer Masara Al-Sharieh brought with her as she began her work with the alliance.
“We are doing this as a way to reach some new people with these messages and create a visual representation of what we’re trying to do in getting more people covered,” Holman said.
Holman said AHK’s primary focus is affordable health care, and this can include both behavioral and physical health.
“We really are focused on that access portion so people are able to have their needs met whether they are physical or mental, substance related or any other need they might have relative to health care,” she said.
This is AHK’s first time trying this kind of project, but Holman said she looks at “Mapping the Gap” as a creative way to reach the public.
“It’s an exciting opportunity to be in communities like Liberal and meet some new people we haven’t talked to already,” she said.
For some time, Kansas has had a huge need for mental and behavioral services, and Holman said that need continues at this time.
“We have a shortage of providers, and there’s difficulty even for our clinics and community mental health centers to be able to hire all of the providers they need,” she said. “Part of that is on the other side of all four of our borders in Kansas, there are states that have already implemented Medicaid expansion, and they’re able to pay more to those providers.”
Holman said AHK leaders are hearing from community mental health partners of the struggles to find providers.
“There are community mental health providers on the other side of the border who are able to pay more, pay signing bonuses and have been for a number of years taking those Kansas providers across the border,” she said.
Getting Medicaid expansion in Kansas, Holman said, will cut down on the level of uncompensated care in Kansas and allow providers to be on a level playing field with the ones across the border in Oklahoma, Colorado, Nebraska and Missouri.
“That’s one of the ways,” she said. “There are certainly a lot of issues that need to be addressed within mental health and also access to health in our state, but this policy is something that there is already an answer to help us bring in more dollars to be able to provide this assistance.”
With Medicaid expansion already in place in 40 other states, Holman said this increases the need for expansion in Kansas.
“We are actually behind the curve in taking this extension, and that’s why we’re really focusing on this, although I realize there are many ways the system could be improved,” she said.
Access to care, Holman said, is AHK’s primary focus.
“There would be ways for someone to be able to access affordable care in any way they would need it,” she said. “That’s mental health. That’s physical health. That is chronic diseases, all of the things that might be challenging for a person being able to live a healthy and successful life.”
While providers are being lured to surrounding states, Holman said the important issue is getting care to patients.
“We know not everybody has the resources to be able to drive to a community on the other side of the border,” she said. “We want to make sure in Kansas, we have those resources for people to receive their care right here in their home communities or as close as we can possibly make it to those communities.”
Holman said it is preferred to have care closer to home.
“What we’re looking at is trying to get people the care they need, but I think what’s more important in the work we do is helping them to be able to pay for it,” she said. “Wherever they’re getting their care, if they don’t have a way to pay for that care either through insurance or through Medicaid coverage, they’re still going to have a barrier in some cases, and that’s what we’re trying to address.”
Overall, Holman said, the goal is to get people who live in Kansas the ability to afford the care they need.
“For us, when we talk about that issue with the borders, we’re really talking just about one facet of what we’re trying to do,” she said. “The most important part is trying to help people be able to pay for their care through insurance coverage.”
With Liberal being the first stop on the “Mapping the Gap” tour, Holman said she is not sure what the impact of the project will be.
“Our plan is to create this piece of art, and we’re going to have it displayed across the state in various places with an explanation,” she said. “We hope it’ll get in front of a lot of people and be instructive and educational for them to understand what the opportunity is we have and the need to protect those resources at the federal level.”
Holman too said she was unsure of where the eventual finished piece will be displayed.
“We haven’t quite decided where it’s going to be at the end of this process, but hopefully, it will be somewhere where people can see it on a regular basis,” she said.
