Burlingame Rallies Against Medi-Cal Cuts

In the face of potential cuts to Medi-Cal funding effective Dec. 1, participants and staff of the Mills-Peninsula Senior Focus Adult Day Health Program (ADHP) fought back Thursday, holding a rally at their Burlingame facility.

Of about the 110 people in the program, 60 depend on Medi-Cal for their enrollment.

“It’s terribly important,” said Program Director Maureen Dunn of ADHP, which works to stimulate participants physically, cognitively and socially. “Any of these folks could be sitting at home watching TV all day.”

They decided on holding a rally after learning of a larger rally Thursday at City Hall in San Francisco. Since many of the program participants are frail, the Mills-Peninsula staff decided to host their own event.

Dunn said the decision to cut Medi-Cal funding came in the spring, with suggested savings to the state of $175 million. Of that, $85 million was to be set aside for redesigning the Medi-Cal system. However, she said that step has yet to occur.

“We’re all quite upset and concerned about this,” Dunn said.

As of Dec. 1, roughly half of the Mills-Peninsula Adult Day Health Program participants could lose their ability to attend the facility.

“The whole point of our program is to keep people out of nursing homes, emergency rooms and hospitals,” Dunn said.  “The state decided they could save $175 million by cutting the program, but our argument has been…many of these folks are going to end up at more expensive levels of care.”

Without the medical and social services provided by ADHP, the same citizens are more likely to end up in nursing homes or making frequent visits to emergency rooms, which will end up being more of a financial burden to the state than Medi-Cal, Dunn said.

The services at ADHP include physical therapy, speech therapy, occupational therapy and nursing. Additionally, the participants receive visits from dieticians, podiatrists and psychiatrists throughout the month. The program is formatted to fit the varying array of needs of each patient. Social and recreational activities, including art and music classes, entertainment and holiday celebrations, are also available.

Patients made signs—written in English, Chinese, Spanish, Russian and Arabic—and cheered as Dunn read out patient satisfaction surveys.

“I actually just kind of said how important it was for us to be able to sustain the program, because we knew it meant a lot to them,” she said. “Senior Focus is still going to be here, but we want to make sure [they’re] all still here.”