Category: Health, Mental Health & Recovery
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Medicare Fraud That Recruits Through Churches Exploits Social Trust
The Justice Department filed a civil False Claims Act complaint on September 17, 2026, alleging that executives associated with an Atlanta clinical laboratory used testing schemes that targeted faith communities and older adults. The government alleges that Medicare paid millions of dollars for testing generated through unlawful kickbacks and without individualized judgment from a treating…
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Language Access Belongs in the Social Work Service Budget
A social worker cannot meaningfully assess a person’s needs if the conversation depends on words that person cannot understand. Yet language assistance can be treated as an inconvenience to arrange after an appointment has begun. Social work agencies should regard competent interpretation and understandable written information as part of the service they are responsible for…
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UnitedHealthcare’s Coaching Model Challenges Social Work to Explain Its Value
UnitedHealthcare’s use of behavioral coaches raises a serious question for social work: what happens when an insurer can offer practical emotional support through a shorter and potentially less expensive route than licensed clinical treatment? The answer could affect clinical referrals, wages, professional responsibilities, and the case that universities make for a social work degree. It…
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Social Work Agencies Should Give Peer Recovery Workers Authority, Support, and Fair Pay
Recovery Month offers social work agencies an opportunity to examine how they employ people with lived experience of substance use disorders. Inviting a peer worker to a meeting can signal inclusion, but the more revealing questions concern pay, supervision, decision making, and working conditions. Agencies that value this contribution should show it in the structure…
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Healthy Aging Requires Practical Support, and Social Work Should Help Deliver It
Healthy Aging Month is an opportunity to examine what makes everyday independence possible. Advice about exercise, nutrition, and social connection becomes more useful when people have the resources to act on it. Social work should help identify and address the practical conditions that turn a reasonable recommendation into an achievable part of daily life. In…
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Vermont’s $11.7 Million Rural Care Investment Needs Social Workers at the Center
On September 10, 2026, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced $11.7 million for rural health care in Vermont. The investment could expand access and strengthen fragile services. It will fall short, however, if workforce planning treats social workers as peripheral to rural care. The initiative includes $9 million in tuition benefits for health…
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CMS Found $3.4 Billion in Suspected Equipment Fraud. Stop Treating Beneficiaries as the Problem
On September 8, 2026, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced action against 11 medical equipment suppliers associated with more than $3.4 billion in suspected improper billing during 2025 and 2026. The scale of the alleged scheme should change how social workers talk about program integrity. Fraud in public benefits is often framed as…
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Food, Shelter, and Therapy: Social Work’s Misplaced Priorities
A person worried about the next meal or tonight’s sleeping arrangement may also need mental health treatment. The failure of a service system is not that it offers therapy, but that it can offer therapy more readily than a practical answer to hunger, unsafe housing, or an interrupted income. This final article in The Social…
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Washington’s Wildfires Show Why Disaster Social Work Cannot Begin After Evacuation
Wildfires near Spokane County prompted a federal public health emergency in August and new Medicare and Medicaid flexibilities for Washington. Federal guidance addressed continuity of care, dialysis, replacement medical equipment, prescription access, privacy, language assistance, and support for state health programs. Each provision responds to a real need. Together, they show why disaster social work…
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When the Problem Is Systemic: Race, Indigenous Traditions, and the Limits of Individual Therapy
When a person experiences discrimination, displacement, or insecurity, an intervention can help them cope while leaving the source of harm untouched. Social work must be willing to ask whether its response changes the conditions of suffering or merely asks the person suffering to accommodate them. This second article in The Social Work Reformer’s series examines…