Linton v. Commissioner Of Health And Environment

779 F. Supp. 925 (1990)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Linton (P) suffers from rheumatoid arthritis and has been a patient for four years at Green Valley. P was a Medicaid patient who had been receiving skilled nursing facility (SNF) level care throughout her stay. P received notice from D that she no longer qualified for such care. The same notice advised her that she would have to move to another nursing home, an intermediate care facility (ICF), to receive the level of care to which D believed she should be downgraded. Green Valley provides ICF care. The bed occupied by was certified for Medicaid purposes for provision of both SNF and ICF levels of care. But, Green Valley was unwilling to care for P at an ICF level of reimbursement. The nursing home, which had directed D to certify only part of its ICF beds as available to Medicaid patients, reserved the right to decertify P's bed for Medicaid ICF participation. This decertification would have compelled P's involuntary transfer to another facility. P asserts that D's limited bed certification policy creates an artificial restriction on the number of available Medicaid beds and that it fosters discrimination against Medicaid patients by nursing homes. D participates in Title XIX. Approximately, seventy percent of the cost of D's Medicaid program is paid by the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) of the United States Department of Health and Human Services. For receipt of federal subsidies, D is required to administer its Medicaid program in conformity with a state plan which satisfies the requirements of Title XIX and regulations promulgated pursuant thereto, and which has been submitted to, and approved by the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Ps are before the Court seeking to enjoin D's policy through which only a portion of the beds in Medicaid participating nursing homes are certified to be available for Medicaid patients. Ps allege that this policy artificially limits the accessibility of nursing home care to indigent Medicaid patients and fosters discrimination against indigent patients by nursing homes. Ps posit that the policy had an unjustifiable disparate impact on minorities.