Many of our clients are transitioning from a status of needing a lot of Medicare coverage to a lot of Medicaid coverage in addition to Medicare. We all expect Medicare to cover acute medical care needs, skilled care and rehabilitation, while Medicaid could cover the cost of custodial care. But one important issue is transportation. If you are on Medicaid, transportation to needed medical services will be covered as long as the transportation provider accepts Medicaid. But Medicare is supposed to cover a lot of transportation costs as well, and has, until recently. It is now being reported that Medicare is requiring very strict prior authorizations for coverage of transportation to places like dialysis and wound care centers. It is important for people in the community to have their doctors prepare these prior authorizations where they can be predicted. Here are CMS’s policy and forms for doing this.