Missouri Senate Bill SB498

Missouri 2025 Regular Session

• Introduced: 1/2/25

Caption

BILL WITHDRAWN

Summary

SB 498 would require MO HealthNet, Missouri’s Medicaid program, to cover a home blood pressure monitoring device for pregnant and postpartum women. The bill adds that benefit to the list of covered services for eligible children, pregnant women, and blind persons, and defines the device as a mobile device used to measure blood pressure. It also creates a new insurance mandate in a separate section requiring health benefit plans delivered, issued, renewed, or continued in Missouri on or after January 1, 2026, and that provide maternity benefits, to cover a home blood pressure monitoring device for pregnant and postpartum women. In addition to the new blood pressure-monitoring coverage, the bill amends a broad Medicaid statute, section 208.152, which governs many MO HealthNet benefits and payment rules. The bill text also includes a number of existing Medicaid provisions, but the operative change is the addition of coverage for home blood pressure monitoring in both Medicaid and private health plans with maternity benefits. The bill would therefore affect MO HealthNet administration, Medicaid providers, and insurers offering maternity coverage in Missouri.

Impact

The bill would expand state law by adding a specific covered benefit for home blood pressure monitoring devices for pregnant and postpartum women under MO HealthNet and by imposing a parallel coverage requirement on qualifying health benefit plans. It would affect section 208.152, RSMo, by inserting the new Medicaid benefit, and it would create section 376.1960 to regulate private health insurance coverage. The practical effect would be to require Medicaid and applicable insurers to pay for a home blood pressure monitoring device when maternity benefits are provided, beginning with the bill’s effective coverage date for health plans of January 1, 2026.

Sentiment

The available legislative record shows no committee transcript, no recorded votes, and the bill status is listed as withdrawn. Because there is no discussion or vote history, there is no documented floor or committee sentiment to measure. Based on the text alone, the bill appears to be a targeted maternal-health coverage measure, which typically suggests a policy intent focused on preventive care and postpartum monitoring rather than broader program restructuring.

Contention

No specific points of contention are documented in the provided materials because there are no committee transcripts or votes. Potential areas of debate, based on the bill text, would likely include the cost of adding a new Medicaid and insurance mandate, whether the coverage requirement should apply to all maternity plans, and how the benefit would be administered and reimbursed. However, those concerns are not expressly reflected in the available legislative history.