Kansas Stories: Vicki Pribble

Vicki Pribble is from Parsons, KS. She lives there with her two sons, Michael and Christopher. Vicki has insurance through Medicare and Christopher has health benefits from his dad, but Michael is unable to get health insurance. Michael lost his coverage through the Children’s Health Insurance Program when he turned 19 and he’s been without […]

Topics: All Consumer Stories, Behavioral Health, Disability Stories

Kansas Stories: Stephanne

Stephanne is from Jackson County. She is a mom and an active breastfeeding advocate for the Kansas Breastfeeding Coalition, providing peer-to-peer breastfeeding support. She pushes for moms to have access to Medicaid for longer than the two months after the birth of their child. She also wants Medicaid expansion to happen in Kansas. Stephanne had […]

Topics: All Consumer Stories, Behavioral Health

Kansas Stories: Sarah

Sarah* is from Wichita. She spent her career in law enforcement and is now retired. She has a 29-year-old son who suffers from addiction. It’s because of him that Sarah began her advocacy for Medicaid expansion, even though talking about his addiction is painful for her. Sarah’s son has no health insurance and there isn’t […]

Topics: All Consumer Stories, Behavioral Health, Medical Debt Stories

Kansas Stories: Carolyn

Carolyn Thomas was uninsured for a significant portion of her children’s adolescence. Fortunately, those children were able to be covered by Medicaid. She is a single mother who worked in warehouses to earn a living, where she developed Achilles tendinitis. This made working long shifts at the warehouse immensely difficult. After working nine straight days […]

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Kansas Stories: Randy

Randy Keith is from Wichita, where he lives with his wife of 13 years and their two children. Randy lost his job in January but worked hard to line up a new one by March. Things were looking up for the family, but then COVID-19 hit Kansas, and the job was no longer available. Randy […]

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Kansas Stories: Kelsi

“Every constituent, citizen, human, has value and potential and will put more in to their community than they take out if they are loved and healthy. Let’s start with love and make quality healthcare something for everyone.” Kelsi Depew is from Arlington, KS. She is married with three young children. Kelsi an her husband both […]

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Catching up with our health care storytellers

By Marissa Alcantar | June 6, 2020 As the Alliance for a Healthy Kansas’ storybank fellow, my job for the past year has been seeking out uninsured Kansans and learning about their experiences with our health care system. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, I wanted to check in with some of the storytellers […]

Topics: All Consumer Stories, Behavioral Health, Workforce Stories

Kansas Stories: Debra Stanley

Debra lives in Iola and is currently uninsured. She gets chronic migraines and has depression, anxiety, PTSD, chronic fatigue syndrome and asthma. On top of all that, Debra recently discovered she has Type 2 diabetes. Managing one chronic condition without insurance is hard enough. Debra is trying to manage seven. She is in the coverage […]