Brian R. Grossman publishes paper in Disability and Rehabilitation

DHD assistant professor Brian R. Grossman authored, “Disability and corporeal (im)mobility: how interstate variation in Medicaid impacts the cross-state plans and pursuits of personal care attendant service users.”

This paper addresses how Medicaid personal care attendant (PCA) service users with physical disabilities experience barriers to cross-state movement arising from the interstate variation in these programs.

Participants described their experiences (1) contending with conflicts between the need for services and the desire for cross-state moves; (2) navigating “hoops of fire”; and (3) recasting imagined futures. Participants also expressed experiences of intrastate confinement, or being stuck in their current state (4) using metaphors of immobility and (5) recognizing intrastate confinement as a form of categorical exclusion. Interstate variation in Medicaid PCA policy impedes program users’ ability to pursue educational and occupational advancement, and leads to feelings of second-class citizenship. Policy changes should be explored to affirm the autonomy of Medicaid PCA service users.