A woman’s fight to escape the hospital shows Medicaid’s limits for disabled Texans

TexasKaitlyn Cunningham sits in her wheel chair in the hallway of Cedar Park Regional Medical Center in Cedar Park, Texas on March 13. Cunningham and her mom Kathy Cunningham would walk down the hallway to look outside of the hospital windows at the birds.After surviving five surgeries and near organ failure, Kaitlyn Cunningham just wanted to go home. Instead, she would face another trial — fighting her way out of the hospital.

Trying to secure that care, though, would send the Cunninghams into a dizzying circle of siloed programs — an experience not uncommon for medically complex Texans, especially those who are on Medicaid waivers, specialized programs that offer services like caregiving and therapies. Her Medicaid waiver program, Community Living Assistance and Support Services, or CLASS, made those therapies and access to caregivers possible. But she hadn’t used nursing services offered through CLASS before.

It’s a “problem across waiver programs,” Corbett said, although CLASS, as an example, is a more difficult program to get medical services through. Kathy Cunningham rests her hand on her daughter Kaitlyn Cunningham’s hospital bed in Cedar Park Regional Medical Center.This introduced Kathy Cunningham to the second, larger problem in the system: the nursing shortage. She searched for weeks and finally found one person who fit all the qualifications to interview. And even then, he might not want to work with her daughter, Kathy Cunningham said.

“I just am so afraid, the one time I don't hear it, will be the one time it's really important,” Kathy Cunningham said.

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