Children living in high-risk homes should be tested at one and two years of age. Testing your child is simple, is covered by Medicaid and other insurance programs, and takes just a few minutes. A simple "capillary" test can protect your child from permanent harm.

According to the Michigan Department of Community Health, your child is "high-risk" if you can answer "yes" to even one of the following questions:

1. Does your child live in one of Michigan's 15 high-risk communities? High-risk communities include the cities of Grand Rapids, Muskegon, Muskegon Heights, Kalamazoo, Battle Creek, Benton Harbor, Jackson, Lansing, Dearborn, Detroit, Flint, Hamtramck, Highland Park, Pontiac, and Saginaw.

2. Is your child on Medicaid, MI-Child or WIC?

3. Are any one of the following conditions true for your child?

F. Is the child included in a special population group; e.g., foreign adoptee, refugee, immigrant, foster care child?

If you answered "yes" to any of the questions above, your child should be tested at his or her one-year and two-year well-child checkup or WIC visit. If your child is older than two years but less than six, you answered "yes" to any of the questions, and he or she has not yet been tested, please have your child tested as soon as possible.

If your family has a child under the age of six and you move into a high-risk community, or situations change such that you can answer "yes" to any of the questions in A-F above, your child should be tested again even if he or she was tested when younger.

If your child's doctor is reluctant to test your child, click here for a fact sheet from the Michigan Department of Community Health that can be shared with your child's doctor. This fact sheet describes which children should be tested.

If you have no health insurance or are looking for another option, you may have your child tested at the county public health department. The Kent County Health Department will test at-risk children from Kent County for free. For more information, call (616) 632-7063.