Insurance Coverage for Speech Therapy Enactments & DE’s Mammogram Coverage Mandate

Insurance Coverage for Speech Therapy Developing Legislative Trend?

Pennsylvania became the second state to enact legislation (HB 2268) requiring health insurers to cover speech therapy for children who stutter. The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Brandon Markosek (D), said he drafted it after meeting with former NBA star Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, who stuttered until receiving speech therapy in college and who started a foundation to help those who stutter after retiring from the NBA in 2020.

Kidd-Gilchrist’s star power helped get a bill dealing with insurance coverage for speech therapy enacted in Kentucky (SB 111) in April, and Delaware lawmakers sent a similar measure (HB 273) to Gov. John Carney (D) in June. Kid-Gilchrest said he’s contacted lawmakers in over a dozen states about taking up the issue. (PLURIBUS NEWS, LEXISNEXIS STATE NET)

DE Mandates Coverage of Mammograms

Delaware Gov. John Carney (D) signed a bill (HB 253) requiring private health insurers, the state employee health plan and Medicaid to cover annual mammograms for women over the age of 40 whether they have a referral from their physician or not. The measure also requires mammography facilities to provide mammograms to patients without referrals or provide them written notice that they don’t perform mammograms without referrals. (DELAWARE PUBLIC MEDIA)

—Compiled by SNCJ Managing Editor KOREY CLARK

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