Money for Children's Medical Expenses

My blog is focused primarily on cleft palates, cleft lips, and dental care. However, this resource I discovered today, could be beneficial to any child in need of medical care. With the increasing cost of just about everything these days, we can all use a little monetary help. Especially when it comes to paying high costs for proper medical care for our children.

Whether you need help to purchase hearing aids for your child, a new wheelchair or braces, to physical therapy, speech therapy, or extensive surgery to correct an abnormality, financial help is just an application away.

UnitedHealthcare Children's Foundation has medical grants available up to $5,000.00 per child!

Of course there are criteria your family must meet in order to qualify, but it looks relatively simple. If you think you can apply and get the cash in your own pocket, stop here. It doesn't work that way. If approved for a grant, the money will be paid directly to the Health Care Professional upon your submittal of the bills. Basically, they will cover what your insurance won't.

Medicaid, Medicare, and other state or federal subsidized health insurance recipients do NOT qualify for these grants. Also, if your child just recently had surgery, orthodontia work, or other medical services, those services do NOT qualify, just future services. They don't cover past medical expenses. However, if your child has more medical care that will be needed, keep reading.

So who does qualify?

1. The child must be 16 years old or younger AND live in the United States.

2. You or your spouse have commercial health insurance coverage. (For instance, you have health coverage through your employer with BCBS, Aetna, etc. Health Insurance that you pay for directly because your self-employed, a sole propietor. Health Insurance provided to city, state, federal, and government employees. All of these qualify.)

3. Your family's total AGI on your most recent tax return, is less than $20,000 PER family member. (For instance, if your a family of 4, your AGI can not exceed $80,001.)

4. Your child resides with you at least 51% of the year AND they were listed on your most recent tax return as your dependent. (This would probably only be an issue for a divorced couple who shares custody. If this is the case, you would need to submit your current tax return and the last return that you were able to claim the child as a dependent.)

5. If the above are met, they will also take into consideration the severity of the child's illness, the potential to improve the child's quality of life, and the financial burden the expenses would cause the family......right down to the copays.

So if you or someone you know might benefit from a grant, go apply today! What do you have to lose? You may just get the little boost you have been waiting for to proceed with a medical necessity for your child.

For more information or to apply, click here:

http://www.uhccf.org/apply.html

Cleft Palate, Cleft Lip, and Pregnancy

Do you have a cleft palate or cleft lip? A family member with one or both? Know someone who has a child that was born with a Cleft? Are you expecting or trying to conceive? If you answered yes to any of these questions, you may be interested in the following........

RTI International, University of Iowa, and the University of Sau Paulo have teamed up with the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research and the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development for an Oral Cleft Prevention Program.

According to ClinicalTrials.gov, the collaborating teams listed above are actively recruiting participants for a Folic Acid Study. As listed on their website, "The purpose of this study is to asses if taking 4 mg of folic acid per day at preconception and during the first three months of pregnancy decreases the risk of having a child with cleft lip and palate compared to 0.4 mg folic acid for women who have an oral cleft or have had previously child with an oral cleft."

Folic Acid deficiency has been proven to cause facial clefts in lab animals. I've found several articles that reference a study conducted in Norway from 1996 to 2001. According to statistics, Norway has the highest occurrence of Facial Clefts in Europe, which also apparently does not allow their foods to be fortified with folic acid.

Also, taking folic acid during preconception and the first trimester, has been proven to reduce the recurrence of neural tube defects. Neural tube defects affect the brain and spinal cord, such as Spina Bifida.

The current Prevention Program began in 2006 and has a scheduled completion date of September 2011. If you or someone you know is interested in more information regarding this study, you can locate it here: http://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/record/NCT00397917?term=cleft+palate&recr=Open&rank=2

Not interested in joining the program, but still want to reduce your risks? You can buy a Folic Acid, B Vitamin supplement over the counter. Or increase your intake of leafy vegetables, citrus fruit, beans, and whole grains.

In other words, start your day with a Grapefruit for breakfast, then at lunch have yourself a big, fat Spinach salad with Mandarin Oranges, Clementines, Kumquats, and Tangerines. Try it.....I bet it tastes better than it sounds......especially if topped with Raspberry Vinaigrette Dressing.

I think dinner is ready.

Stay Tuned......

Now that my journey to a new mouth and smile is complete, what do I have to share with others? I enjoy writing and have actually enjoyed "owning" my own blog. While I'm not a professional blogger by any means, it's something I look forward to improving and updating.

So where do I go from here? I think a good start would be committing to at least 2 updates a week.

I'm going to attempt to inform, educate, and teach you something new weekly. Topics will be centered around Dental News, Cranialfacial Abnormalities, Maxillofacial Advances, or Pediatric Dental Care. Anything that relates to Cleft Lips and Cleft Palates to Support of Families affected by Birth Defects.

If you have any topic suggestions that you would like me to touch on or dig into deeper, please feel free to recommend them.

Your my audience and I want to keep you hooked like a badly needed dose of Latte.

For now...........Smile, because Monday is almost here.