One year after a state audit faulted The Medical Care Programs Administration (MCPA) for lax oversight of emergency services for illegal immigrants and ineligible care providers, compliance is improving, a report released Thursday found.
A review of progress on the issues found in the July 2006 audit found minimal to significant progress in most areas, the report stated. Findings were more reserved than an internal MCPA audit that found many issues “corrected.”
“The bottom line is, I think they told us we were on the right track and if we continue in this way, the next time around we should be found in compliance,” said Charles Lehman, executive director of Operations, Eligibility and Pharmacy for the MCPA, an agency of the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
The 2006 audit concluded that “MCPA?s fiscal accountability and compliance rating was unsatisfactory.”
Most of the recommendations were still in the process of being implemented and a quick turnaround was not expected, the letter accompanying the report stated, “as they relate to complex issues that require extensive time and effort to resolve.”
Since the audit came out, the agency moved their audit staff into the health department?s Office of Inspector General.
“The Department takes the audit report?s findings very seriously, and as a result has initiated several initiatives to improve audit compliance and accountability,” Health Secretary John M. Colmers said in a letter.
