If a child removes money from your joint account, that could be considered a transfer to him. Currently, Medicaid has a “look back” period on transfers of assets within the past 60 months. This means that any gifts or other transfers of assets you made in the 60 months before you applied for Medicaid will be assessed in order to determine your eligibility. If you did transfer assets in the five year period before applying for Medicaid, you could be subjected to a penalty. Therefore, if you made a transfer of assets in the past five years, you should not apply for Medicaid without consulting an elder law attorney because the penalties could be severe.