ABA insurance and Medicaid coverage in Tennessee

Last researched October 21, 2026

Who pays for ABA in Tennessee, and what a practice has to do to bill them. Coverage details here come from statutes and agency pages we read, not from payer marketing.

Autism insurance mandate

Medium confidence: reputable secondary source

State mandate for autism coverage: Yes, the research found a state autism coverage law.
Statute: Tenn. Code Ann. § 56-7-2367; § 56-7-2360; Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance bulletin dated August 1, 2019.
Age limits: Section 56-7-2367 expressly addresses children younger than 12. Separately, the August 2019 insurance-department bulletin requires medically necessary, appropriate, nonexperimental autism treatment, including ABA, to be covered under mental-health parity requirements. The bulletin does not state an autism-specific age cutoff; the older under-12 provision should not be treated as the complete coverage rule.
Annual cap: Section 56-7-2367 specifies no autism-specific annual dollar amount and permits benefit limits no more restrictive than those for other neurological disorders. The 2019 bulletin additionally requires mental-health parity for medically necessary ABA.
Excludes self-funded employer plans: We could not verify this yet - check with your state insurance department.
Notes: The 2006 autism statute applies to relevant policies delivered, issued, amended or renewed on or after January 1, 2007. It includes self-insured group arrangements only to the extent federal law does not preempt application, so a blanket statement covering every self-funded arrangement is unsupported. It excludes accident-only, specified-disease, hospital-indemnity, Medicare-supplement, long-term-care and other limited-benefit hospital policies. Statutory text was read in Justia's 2025 compilation; the ABA parity interpretation was read in the official insurance-department bulletin. General information, not legal advice.

Sources (3)

Medicaid ABA coverage

Medium confidence: reputable secondary source

Medicaid covers ABA: Yes, per the sources below.
Program: TennCare (Medicaid) ABA benefit delivered through MCOs
Agency: Division of TennCare; contracted MCOs include BlueCare Tennessee, UnitedHealthcare Community Plan and Wellpoint.
Provider enrollment: https://www.tn.gov/tenncare/providers/provider-registration/how-to-apply.html

Sources (5)

Payers named in our research

Names come from the research behind this page. Appearing here does not mean a payer is accepting new providers or that networks are open. Always confirm directly with the payer.

Medicaid managed care plans

Wellpoint (formerly Amerigroup) - TennCare MCO per TennCare managed care contractors page.
BlueCare Tennessee - TennCare MCO per TennCare managed care contractors page; TennCare Select is also listed.
UnitedHealthcare Community Plan of Tennessee - TennCare MCO per TennCare managed care contractors page.

How to enroll

Start at the state Medicaid provider enrollment page: https://www.tn.gov/tenncare/providers/provider-registration/how-to-apply.html.
Ask each commercial payer you want to bill for its credentialing application and timeline. We have not verified payer timelines.
Confirm which staff types the payer reimburses, including whether technicians must hold the RBT credential. See BT vs RBT in Tennessee.

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