NASHVILLE – Tennessee’s Medicaid program has to provide applicants with a fair hearing if it cannot process their requests on time, under an order that’s been upheld by a federal appeals court.
Applications for most forms of Medicaid should be processed within 45 days, by law. Applications based on disability are allowed 90 days.
Applicants for TennCare – Tennessee’s version of Medicaid – sued in July 2014, complaining that their applications had been pending for months, and the state had refused to provide hearings.
A federal judge in Nashville issued a preliminary injunction in September 2014 requiring hearings for those whose applications were not timely processed. The injunction is a temporary ruling in effect while the case works its way through the courts. The judge also granted the lawsuit class-action status, meaning anyone in a similar situation to the original plaintiffs could be considered a plaintiff.
The state appealed, asking the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to dismiss the lawsuit on technical grounds.