ACE KIDS ACT

Children’s Cause for Cancer Advocacy supports S. 298/H.R. 546, The Advancing Care for Exceptional Kids Act of 2015 (The ACE Kids Act). Children with cancer, like children with other medical complexities, often see multiple specialists and a variety of physicians.  There are over 30,000 children with cancer covered by the Medicaid system and the specialized care they require often takes them across state lines. Under the current Medicaid system, parents of children with cancer and other multiple, life threatening disabilities struggle to coordinate the complex, multi-state care of their kids.  Only federal legislation can fix the fragmented system for children with medical complexity.

The ACE Kids Act would create an organized system of health care delivery for this unique population of children to ensure ready access across state lines and to reduce the burden on their families.

  • Nationally designated children’s hospitals networks created under the ACE Kids Act would employ national quality standards and coordinate care, both essential to improving quality and saving money.
  • These networks would include the full range of acute, post-acute and primary care providers, with children’s hospitals as anchors, and a focus on outpatient care to ensure children get the care that they need in the most appropriate settings closest to home, while reducing hospitalizations and emergency room visits.  
  • The ACE Kids Act can deliver savings to Medicaid through increased efficiencies, including reducing hospitalizations and emergency room visits, while providing the array of outpatient and community services and support needed by these children.  

We are honored to join the nation’s leading children’s hospitals, along the Children’s Hospital Association, to support this legislation, which is voluntary for states, families, children’s hospitals and other providers.