KIMBALL, Mich. (WXYZ) — One year ago this week cuts in benefits for people who survived car accidents with catastrophic injuries in Michigan went into effect. It was part of auto no-fault reform and cut benefits paid by 45% across the board.
Many patients and their care providers thought the law would be changed by the legislature, but that didn’t happen.
First Call Home Healthcare tells WXYZ-TV it sent notices to 40 patients. As of July 1, it can no longer provide them with care.
“Why are we being punished and having this care stripped away from us?” asked Jason Reim, a crash survivor
Reim says he did everything right. He paid for auto insurance. After a crash in 1999 on black ice left him a quadriplegic, for more than two decades that insurance covered care every day.
Then Michigan’s Republican-controlled legislature and Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer changed the contract retroactively, cutting benefits 45% across the board.
Reim says he is relying on volunteers, family, friends, and people he knows from church to stop by and help him get out of bed in the morning and provide care he, in the past, received from a professional. He is grateful he has people to turn to but says it still feels like he is losing a sense of dignity.
“I am kind of a shy person when it comes to my body I don’t need people I go to church with or friends or family seeing me in a state of undress. It is disheartening, I guess," said Reim.
“I am sick to my stomach for my patients and my families, but I am sickened over how the legislature has not taken the time to learn what this law has done to these people,” said Bob Mlynarek, Co-Owner of First Call Home Healthcare.
Mlynarek says the company has spent more than a million dollars subsidizing care since the law changed. The debt just continues to grow. The company recommended patients who could not find care be taken to the hospital.
Jason, who is used to independence with the support of caregivers, says he is afraid that would result in him being sent to a nursing home.
“I would be stuck there. It would be like a prison,” he said.
Jason wants independence but says without care it is dangerous. Jason right now suffers from wounds and no longer has daily wound care set up.
“Wound care is a big issue for quadriplegics and paraplegics. Without daily attention from someone who knows how to dress and treat a wound, it gets worse and worse and worse. And can be fatal,” said Mlynarek.
“It is a horrible situation,” said Reim.
Republican Michigan House Speaker Jason Wentworth earlier this year said it was time to move on from no-fault auto insurance reforms, so a legislative fix seems unlikely.
The Court of Appeals is considering arguments over whether the patients' hours have been retroactively impacted.
