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How States Are Using Medicaid Waivers to Help Incarcerated Individuals Get Care and Transition Back into Their Communities
Compared to the general population, individuals who are incarcerated have higher rates of mental illness, substance use disorder, and chronic disease. However, the federal “inmate exclusion” policy prohibits Medicaid coverage for people who are incarcerated (except for limited inpatient hospital services). When people leave incarceration, they are at greater risk of overdose death and suicide, as well as hospitalization and emergency department use. In a new explainer, KFF examines a new waiver opportunity that allows states to request a partial waiver of the inmate exclusion policy from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to help smooth individuals’ transitions back into the community with “reentry services.” These services aim to improve health care transitions, increase continuity of health coverage, reduce disruptions in care, improve health outcomes, and reduce recidivism rates. Read more here.
Related: CSG Justice Center: 50 States, 1 Goal - Examining State-Level Recidivism Trends in the Second Chance Act Era
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During Second Chance Month, HRSA Takes Policy Action, Releases First-Ever Funding Opportunity for Health Centers to Support Transitions in Care for People Leaving Incarceration
Last week, HHS took new policy action and announced the availability of $51 million for the first-ever funding opportunity for HRSA-funded health centers to implement innovative approaches to support transitions in care for people leaving incarceration. This action explicitly supports the provision of health services to individuals during the 90 days prior to their release to help them return to the community by expanding access to primary health care, including mental health and substance use disorder treatment, furthering public health and strengthening public safety. HRSA’s updated policy makes clear that health centers can provide health services to incarcerated individuals who are expected to be or are scheduled for release from a carceral setting within 90 days to help ensure continuity of care as people move home to the community. Read more here.
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New Grant Opportunities from the Mother Cabrini Health Foundation
The 2024 application process for the Mother Cabrini Health Foundation is open through April 25, 2024. Established in 2018, the Mother Cabrini Health Foundation (MCHF) provides grants to improve the health and well-being of vulnerable New Yorkers, bolster the health outcomes of diverse communities, eliminate barriers to care, and bridge gaps in health services across New York State. MCHF focuses on four key areas: Access to health care; Basic needs; Health care workforce; Mental and behavioral health.
2024 Application Timeline
- Letters of Inquiry submission: 4/1 - 4/25
- Invitations for full proposals: June 2024
- Grant decision: October and December 2024
Learn more about MCHF's grants and programs here.
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Nearly 1 in 4 Adults Disenrolled From Medicaid Are Now Uninsured, Survey Finds
The first national survey of adults whose Medicaid eligibility was reviewed during the unwinding found nearly half of people who lost their government coverage signed back up weeks or months later — suggesting they should never have been dropped in the first place. While 23% reported being uninsured, an additional 28% found other coverage — through an employer, Medicare, the Affordable Care Act’s insurance marketplace, or health care for members of the military, the survey by KFF found. Read more here.
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Using Medicaid to Address Young People’s Mental Health Needs in School Settings
Schools offer an invaluable opportunity for providers of mental health services to meet young people where they are — approximately 49.4 million young people were enrolled in public school in fall 2021 and seven of 10 public schools report that the number of students seeking mental health services has increased since 2020. But to address students’ needs, our schools require comprehensive mental health programs, qualified staff, and adequate funding. Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) insure more than 41 million children in the United States, providing them with necessary physical and behavioral health services. Read more here.
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The Ripple Effects of the Adolescent Behavioral Health Crisis: Recent Trends and Impacts on American Adolescents, Families, and Society
A new United Hospital Fund analysis reveals the vast and growing toll of the adolescent behavioral health crisis and its considerable, lifelong ripple effects on medical costs, productivity, and wages. Using data from multiple nationally administered surveys, as well as analytic modeling and expertise from Boston Consulting Group (BCG), The Ripple Effects of the Adolescent Behavioral Health Crisis provides a baseline analysis of the number of adolescents in the United States, New York State, and New York City who have a behavioral health condition and which groups are disproportionately affected. It also calculates the burden of unmet need and the resulting impacts on the individual, family, and society. The report discusses approaches to tackling the crisis beyond addressing the shortage of behavioral health clinicians, including empowering non-clinical staff to connect with adolescents experiencing mild conditions, fighting against stigma surrounding behavioral health, and fostering better dialogue between families, schools, and communities.
Related: Bringing the Hospital Home: Meeting Teens in Crisis Where They Are
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A Wearable Tech Gives Pharmas & Therapists Better Feel for Changes in Mental Health
When it comes to evaluating the health of a patient, each therapeutic area has its own data-gathering tools. Think glucose monitors in diabetes and heart monitors for cardiovascular disease. But in mental health, a clinician relies on what a patient says. Self-reporting is incomplete and lacks objectivity, says George Eleftheriou, CEO and co-founder of Feel Therapeutics.
Feel is trying to bring more complete and objective data collection to the field of mental health. The San Francisco-based startup does it with wearable technology that continuously collects data and provides recommendations. Read more here.
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Only Two Percent of Psychiatrists are Black, Leading Some to Creative Solutions to Fill the Void
Dr. Itoro Ibia’s patient was set to be released from a hospital in Virginia last year when she told a nurse she felt like demonic spirits were hanging around. The woman was being treated for psychosis related to a bipolar manic episode; her confession led hospital staff to believe she was delusional, Ibia said. “She was just being herself and expressing her religious view, but she was about to be detained longer in hospital for expressing those religious views,” said Ibia, a Virginia psychiatrist and fellow of the American Society of Clinical Psychopharmacologists. “The person at the hospital did not understand that. But I did.” Dr. Racquel Reid had a similar experience as a psychiatric resident. While briefing an attending physician, another resident described a patient who was talking about how police were out to get him as delusional. “That’s not psychosis,” said Reid, a Los Angeles-based psychiatrist and mental health activist who runs Radical Imagination Mental Health. “He lives in Atlanta, in a neighborhood that was being gentrified. Of course he feels like the police are out to get him.” Read more here.
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Suicidal Thoughts Alarmingly Common Among Young Kids With Autism, Survey Finds
New research suggests that more than a third of children with autism ages 8 and under have had suicidal thoughts and not all of these kids are necessarily displaying warning signs. In a survey of 968 caregivers of kids with autism ages 8 to 17 across the nation, more than 40% reported that their child wanted to die. The findings were even more striking when researchers looked specifically at children ages 8 and younger. Among this group, 36.2% reported wanting to die, 35.3% reported wanting to end their own life and 18.1% reported having a suicide planned. Read more here.
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Behavioral Health Parity – Pervasive Disparities in Access to In-Network Care Continue
The Mental Health Parity and Addictions Equity Act (MHPAEA) of 2008 aimed to eliminate discriminatory health plan coverage that prevents individuals from receiving effective mental health and substance use disorder treatment. MHPAEA requires that health plans not design or apply financial requirements and treatment limitations that impose a greater burden on access (that is, are more restrictive) to in-network mental health and substance use disorder benefits than plans and issuers impose on access to comparable medical/surgical benefits. In this study, Research Triangle Institute (RTI) used 2019–2021 information from one of the largest commercial insurance claims databases to evaluate a key measure of health plan benefits that indicates whether individuals can access in-network behavioral health treatment as readily as medical/surgical treatment: the rate of use of out-of-network behavioral health providers. Read the report here.
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Integrated Addiction, Primary Care Shows Promise with Team Approach but Faces Billing Hurdles
When family medicine physician Dr. Jennifer Thomas started her first job after her residency, she said she had “no clue” how often she would encounter substance use disorder (SUD) needs in the primary care setting. Thomas, co-national medical director for integrated care at the Collaborative Family Healthcare Association (CFHA), is now part of the movement to better integrate SUD screenings, treatment pipelines and follow-ups into primary care. “We in integrated care should be a place, or aspire to be at a place, where behavioral health screenings and substance use screenings are part of all your visits,” Thomas told Addiction Treatment Business. “If we systematically screen the population we’ll catch folks a lot earlier and have a better chance at intervening early, decreasing morbidity mortality.” Read more here.
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New Resource: Financing Peer Recovery Support: Opportunities to Enhance the Substance Use Disorder Peer Workforce
This report explores and summarizes the financing, utilization, and regulatory structures of providing peer recovery support services (PRSS) for substance use disorder (SUD) recovery process within federal grant programs and state Medicaid programs. Based on analyses and input from an expert panel of behavioral health peer services experts, the report identifies challenges and opportunities to finance and strengthen the PRSS workforce. Read more here.
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UPCOMING EVENTS & TRAININGS
Connecting to Serve: Promising Practices for 988 & 911 Collaboration
April 18, 1 - 2 pm, SAMHSA
Meeting Youth Where They Are: Prevention Programming to Support Mental Health
April 18, 1 - 2:30 pm, NASMHPD
Outreach and Unsheltered Homelessness: Strategies for Health Centers and Service Providers
April 18, 2 - 3 pm, HRSA
The Clubhouse Model: Designing Communities to Empower People with Serious Mental Illness
April 18, 2 - 3:15 pm, The Better Care Playbook
The Essentials and Beyond of Perinatal Psychiatry: Psychopharmacology & Psychotherapy
April 21, 12 - 4 pm, Project TEACH
Black 365: Infiltrate, Educate, Vacate: Empowering Mental Health Professionals for Community Impact
April 22, 2 - 3:30 pm, NTTAC
Optimizing Medicare-Medicaid Integration for Dually Eligible Beneficiaries
April 23, 12:30 - 1:30 pm, Bipartisan Policy Center
Leveraging Relationships with Community-Based Organizations to Meet Health-Related Social Needs
April 24, 12 - 1 pm, CMS
Navigating Mental Health Care for Immigrant and Forcibly Displaced Communities
April 24, 12 - 1 pm, National Council for Mental Wellbeing
Understanding, Connecting & Helping Youth Mental Health Through Screening featuring MHA Oklahoma
April 24, 2 - 3 pm, NASMHPD
Clinical Intensive on Trauma-Responsive Telehealth for Children, Adolescents and their Families
April 25, 10 am - 12 pm, CTAC/MCTAC
Transforming Behavioral Health Systems through Measurement-Based Care
April 25, 1 - 2 pm, Greenspace Health
Discussion Panel: Supporting Young Adults in Reentry through Medicaid Funding
April 25, 2 - 3 pm, CSG Justice Center
Beyond the Numbers and Visuals: Building Your CBO Data-Driven Digital Marketing Strategy
April 25, 2 - 3:30 pm, SAMHSA
Training Treatment Court Teams: Navigating Harm Reduction in Drug Courts
April 29, 2 - 3:30 pm, SAMHSA's GAINS Center
Implementing Evidence-Based Strategies to Reduce Overdose Risk during Reentry
April 29, 3 - 4:30 pm, CSG Justice Center
Social Media and Health: A Primer for Health Care Practitioners and Mental Health Professionals
April 30, 11 am - 12:15 pm, Poison Control Center NYC
Is It MDD Or Bipolar Disorder?
May 1, 12 - 1 pm, PsychU
The Integrative and Systemic Approach to Substance Use Treatment: Therapeutic Tools for Mental Health Therapists
May 1, 12:30 - 1:30 pm, National Council for Mental Wellbeing
Telehealth: A Vital Piece of the Care Access Puzzle
May 1, 2 - 3 pm, NIHCM Foundation
Treatment While Unhoused: Providing MOUD to Populations Experiencing Homelessness
May 1, 3 - 4 pm, National Council for Mental Wellbeing
Implicit Bias: Using Brain Science To Understand, Recognize and Counter It
May 2, 2 - 3:30 pm, National Council for Mental Wellbeing
Screens and Young Children: Strengths-Based Approaches to Support Early Mental and Relational Health
May 8, 2 - 3:30 pm, TTAC
Consumer Perspectives on the Camden Coalition care Management RCT Study Findings
May 9, 12 - 1 pm, Camden Coalition
Beyond Stigma: Mental Health Help-Seeking Behaviors in Teens
May 9, 12 - 1 pm, The JED Foundation
2024 System of Care Virtual Summit
May 14 - 16, 12 - 5 pm, NCCTAC
Advancing Equity in Adoption Through Innovative Provider Payments and Data-Driven Policy Changes
May 15, 1 - 2 pm, Social Current
Innovative Approaches for Improving the Transition from Hospitals to Schools: Supporting Youth During and Following a Suicide-Related Crisis
May 16, 12 - 1 pm, American Foundation for Suicide Prevention
Identifying Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in a Death Investigation
May 16, 2 - 3 pm, OMH SPCNY
Care Coordination For Adult Patients With SMI – From Inpatient To Outpatient
May 22, 12 - 1 pm, PsychU
Translating EDI Practice Into Action: Cultural Humility
June 6, 12 - 1 pm, Social Current
4th Annual Ask a Medicaid Managed Care Plan (MMCP): Billing Event
June 11, 10 am - 3 pm, Albany Capital Center
Introduction to Psychedelics for the Treatment of Substance Use Disorder
June 13, 1 - 3 pm, National Council for Mental Wellbeing
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CLMHD CALENDAR
MAY
Executive Committee Meeting
May 1: 8 - 9 am
Quarterly LGU Billing Staff Call
May 7: 11 am - 12 pm
CLMHD Spring Full Membership Meeting
May 8 - 10, Lake George, NY
LGU Clinic Operators Meeting
May 14: 10 - 11:30 am
Membership Call
May 15: 9 - 10:30 am
Children & Families Committee Meeting
May 21: 11:30 am - 1 pm
LSP Support Session
May 23: 1 - 2:30 pm
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