NABH Supported Behavioral Healthcare Riders in Funding Package Passes House and Awaits Senate Passage
House and Senate Leadership agreed to a six-bill spending package with a March 9 deadline that contains a narrow
list of health measures, including several important NABH priorities. The agreement set up a Wednesday vote in the House, which passed the legislation 339-85 and sent the package to the Senate. The Senate is expected to consider and pass the legislation today or early tomorrow morning to avoid a partial government shutdown. Following passage of the initial package, lawmakers will have roughly three additional weeks to fund HHS as part of the second funding package which has a March 22 deadline.
The limited health care riders include NABH priority provisions to permanently require state Medicaid plans to cover medication-assisted treatment and to create a permanent state Medicaid option allowing treatment of substance use disorder at institutions. Other behavioral health provisions include establishing Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic services as an optional Medicaid benefit, requiring HHS to issue guidance on how states can improve integrating behavioral health with primary care, and a provision to make treatments more streamlined for justice-involved Medicaid beneficiaries — states
must suspend rather than terminate coverage for incarcerated enrollees. The skinny health care package also includes funding to eliminate the statutorily required payment reductions intended to offset hospitals’ uncompensated care costs through Dec. 31, 2024.
Notably excluded from the healthcare package is the Modernizing Opioid Treatment Access Act (MOTAA), which NABH and coalition partners advocated extensively to stop. Other healthcare provisions excluded include an extension of now-expired pandemic provisions allowing employers to offer telehealth as a separate benefit, highly-debated items related to prescription drugs and hospitals, such as pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) reforms, hospital price transparency measures, or any site neutral payment policies for hospitals.
There is the potential that some healthcare provisions could move with the March 22 funding package or in a year-end health package following the November elections. Should another healthcare package emerge, NABH will continue to advocate for remaining SUPPORT Act provision priorities and to prevent any effort to include MOTAA.
HHS Announces Steps to Assist Providers After Change Healthcare Cyberattack
HHS on Thursday announced what the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is doing to help healthcare providers continue to serve patients following the late-February cyberattack on Change Healthcare, a unit of UnitedHealth Group (UHG).
The HHS announcement also said the department is in regular contact with UHG leadership, state partners, and with numerous external stakeholders to better understand the nature of the impacts and to ensure the effectiveness of UHG’s response.
“HHS has made clear its expectation that UHG does everything in its power to ensure continuity of operations for all health care providers impacted and HHS appreciates UHG’s continuous efforts to do so,” said in its statement. “HHS is also leading interagency coordination of the Federal government’s related activities, including working closely with the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the White House, and other agencies to provide credible, actionable threat intelligence to industry wherever possible.”
Click
here to read about the steps CMS is taking to assist providers. And please contact
NABH if your system has been affected by the cyberattack and/or if you have questions for NABH.
SAMHSA Announces $36.9 Million in Behavioral Healthcare Grant Funding
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services (SAMHSA) recently announced $36.9 million in grant program funding to support behavioral healthcare services nationwide.
The funding covers a variety of areas, including $10 million for screening, brief intervention, and referral to treatment; more than $6 million to support first responders and others with training, administering, and distributing naloxone and other Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved opioid overdose reversal medications or devices; and more than $5 million to help expand and ensure that students in health professional receive SUD education early in their academic careers and have a basic knowledge of strategies to identify and treat addiction and support recovery after they graduate.
Click
here to read about the other funding opportunities.
Register for the NABH Education and Research Foundation’s Talent Recruitment Webinars
The
NABH Education and Research Foundation will host a two-part webinar series about talent recruitment featuring NABH members and workforce experts in March and April.
Part I –
Talent Recruitment: Exploring Short-Term Solutions – will be held
Tuesday, March 26, 2024 at 2 p.m. ET. Foundation Vice President Jim Shaheen, CEO of New Season/Colonial Management Group, LP, and Foundation Secretary Mary Pawlikowski, president at Vanderbilt Psychiatric Hospital and Clinics, will join workforce consultant Beth Kuhn of
Stonegate Strategies for this interactive webinar to help NABH members learn about and share their best, short-term solutions to recruiting talent.
Kuhn has more than 30 years of workforce experience and has served in both Democratic and Republican administrations, including in her roles as commissioner of the Kentucky Department of Workforce Investment and as Vermont’s director of workforce development. She has also served as chief engagement officer at the Kentucky Cabinet of Health and Family Services.
The second webinar in this series will examine longer-term solutions to recruiting talent – such as Registered Apprenticeship Programs, education and certification opportunities, fellowships, and more – on
Thursday, April 18 at 2 p.m. ET.
NABH Board Chair Frank Ghinassi, Ph.D., A.B.P.P. president and CEO, Rutgers University Behavioral Health Care and senior vice president, Behavioral Health and Addictions Service Line, RWJBarnabas Health, will lead the April webinar with Kuhn and workforce consultant
John Pallasch of One Workforce Solutions. Pallasch served previously as the assistant secretary for employment and training at the U.S. Labor Department.
Please join us and click
here to register for Part 1 on March 26 and
here to register for Part 2 on April 18!
Alcohol Deaths Jump During Pandemic
A new
CDC study found that more than 178,300 people died from excessive alcohol use during 2020 and 2021 in the U.S., a 29% increase from 2016 and 2017, and that the number of people who died per year increased by more than 40,000 within six years. Female deaths had a 35% spike compared to 27% for males. The report suggests that increases may have been caused by changes in alcohol policies during the COVID-19 pandemic in which many states permitted alcohol carryout and delivery to homes for off-premises consumption.
SAMHSA to Hold Briefing on CFR Amendments
Join a virtual stakeholder briefing on
Thursday, March 14, 3-4 pm ET, unveiling recent amendments to 42 CFR part 8 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) governing opioid treatment program (OTP) certification and treatment standards. Published on Feb. 2, 2024, these revisions aim to enhance care access through reduced barriers, flexible treatment, and telehealth integration. This event will include a presentation from Dr. Yngvild Olsen, director of SAMHSA’s Center for Substance Abuse Treatment (CSAT), others, and followed by a Q&A and discussion.
Register for this breifing
here.
Register Today for the 2024 NABH Annual Meeting!
Please remember to
register for the 2024 NABH Annual Meeting,
The Future of Behavioral Healthcare and
reserve your hotel room at the Salamander Washington, DC from
May 13-15, 2024.
This year’s meeting will examine and discuss critical issues that behavioral healthcare providers manage today and will continue to address tomorrow, including access to care, parity, technology, workforce, the political environment, and more.
We look forward to seeing you in Washington!
Reminder: Please Submit Data to NABH’ Denial-of-Care Portal
NABH thanks all members who have submitted data to the association’s
Denial-of-Care Portal. You have provided critical information that expands the portal and helps NABH strengthen its advocacy efforts related to erroneous prior-authorization denials.
With guidance from our members, NABH has improved the portal by adding two elements:
- Time-based data on the number of days between a request for coverage and a plan’s denial, which improves our ability to assess and compare health plan responsiveness.
- The gap between days of provided care versus days of covered care to quantify and compare uncompensated days per health plan.
We strongly encourage all NABH members to submit their denial-of-care data in the portal. If you need help starting, or if you have other questions, please e-mail NABH Associate Manager for Congressional Affairs
Emily Wilkins.
In Case You Missed It: NABH’s 2024 Advocacy Priorities
Last week NABH released its
2024 Advocacy Priorities, which we urge you to read and share with your Government Relations teams.
Topping NABH’s priorities this year are parity, workforce, behavioral healthcare information technology, America’s ongoing addiction crisis, and the Institutions for Mental Diseases (IMD) exclusion.
Fact of the Week
Research from the Treatment Advocacy Center (TAC) reports that bed availability within state psychiatric hospitals reached a low of 10.8 beds per population of 100,000 in 2023. TAC’s report attributed this trend to a variety of circumstances, including the COVID-19 pandemic and the increasing, disproportionate number of beds filled by individuals from the criminal legal system.
For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond.