NABH Launches Redesigned Website
We are pleased to announce NABH has launched a redesigned website at
www.nabh.org!
The website’s updated design will make it easier for NABH members to access their member benefits, resources and industry news. At the same time, the redesigned site will show policymakers, advocates, and members of the media how the association is working to improve behavioral healthcare services in the United States—and how these stakeholders can engage in that effort.
As you navigate the new site, please note the following features:
- Watch our video Behavioral Healthcare is Everyone’s Concern and access it from a slide on the homepage.
- Navigate news and resources by category in seven tabs at the top of the homepage: Home, About NABH, NABH Resources, News & Insights, Be An Advocate, Policy Issues, and Annual Meeting.
- Click on an interactive Impact Map of the United States for key information about NABH member locations in every congressional district throughout the country.
- Learn what NABH members are doing nationwide in our Member Profile section.
- Get to know the association’s leadership in the Board of Trustees & Staff page.
- Follow the Annual Meeting Countdown on the homepage for a reminder about the association’s signature event every March.
We hope you like the redesigned website, and that you visit often! As always, we welcome your feedback. If you have comments, please
e-mail NABH.
Senate Appropriations Committee Approves HHS Funding for 2019
The Senate Committee on Appropriations this week passed the
FY 2019 Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education (Labor-HHS) Appropriations Act, which provides $3.7 billion to address the opioid crisis and $3.4 billion for mental health treatment, prevention, and research.
According to a summary, the opioid funding is targeted toward improving treatment and prevention efforts; finding alternative pain medications; workforce needs; and behavioral health. Funding to address the opioid crisis has increased by $3.5 billion—or about 1,300 percent—since fiscal year 2015.
Click
here to learn more about the funding levels.
House-Passed Opioid Package Moves to Senate
The House late last week passed H.R. 6:
SUPPORT for Patients and Communities Act, a massive bill to address the nation’s opioid crisis.
The legislation combined 58 individually approved House-passed bills, including many NABH-supported proposals—such as the
IMD CARE Act and the
Overdose Prevention and Patient Safety Act— in one package. House members passed the measure in an overwhelmingly bipartisan vote of 396-14, and the legislation now moves to the Senate for its consideration.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has indicated the Senate will consider opioid legislation later this summer or in the fall. In the upper chamber, the Senate Health, Education, Labor & Pensions (HELP) Committee approved a bipartisan package of proposals in the
Opioid Crisis Response Act, which includes provisions that mirror those in the House’s opioid package.
NABH Sends Comments on FY 2019 Proposed IPF PPS Rule to CMS
Earlier this week NABH sent comments to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) about the agency’s proposed rule to update Medicare payment policies and rates for the Inpatient Psychiatric Facilities Prospective Payment System (IPF PPS) in FY 2019.
The rule proposed eliminating eight quality measures, many of which NABH has advocated for removing previously. With help from the NABH Quality Committee, NABH commented on several provisions for next year and focused primarily on two issues: 1) adopting a policy that would permit CMS to remove measures from the IPFQR set if the costs associated with a measure outweigh the benefit of its continued use in the program; and 2) encouraging CMS to keep the measure related to hours of seclusion and restraint.
NABH Commends Policymakers for Introducing Bill to Boost Behavioral Healthcare Workforce
NABH has sent letters to policymakers in the House and Senate who introduced respective versions of the
Opioid Workforce Act of 2018 to expand and improve addiction medicine, addiction psychiatry, or pain management residency positions to address America’s opioid crisis.
“A major driver of this increase in deaths is an inadequate number of professionals and paraprofessionals who are trained in substance use and addictions,” NABH President and CEO Mark Covall wrote in letters to Rep. Joseph Crowley (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.). “Federal estimates project a workforce deficit of up to 250,000 workers by the year 2025,” Covall continued. “
The Opioid Workforce Act of 2018 will add 1,000 residency positions in addiction medicine, addiction psychiatry, or pain management.”
IPFQR Program FY 2018 Data Submission Period Begins July 1
The Inpatient Psychiatric Facility Quality Reporting (IPFQR) Program Fiscal Year (FY) 2018 data submission period is scheduled to begin on
Sunday, July 1, 2018, and end on
Wednesday, August 15, 2018, at 11:59:59 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time (PDT).
The opportunity to correct or otherwise modify your data ends on the data submission deadline of Wednesday, August 15, 2018, at 11:59:59 p.m. PDT.
Refer to the IPFQR Program Manual, version 3.1, for more information about the IPFQR Program requirements described in this email. The manual is available at:
Also, please note that the IPFQR Program
Resources and Tools page on the
Quality Reporting Center website now includes the IPFQR checklists for submission, review, and verification of FY 2019 data and administrative requirements. The checklists will be available on the
QualityNet website’s IPFQR Program Resources page at a later date.
These checklists are meant to help inpatient psychiatric facilities (IPFs) meet the August 15, 2018 data submission deadline. They provide guidance on submitting data via the
QualityNet Secure Portal and checking the IPF Participation Report for the completion of IPFQR Program administrative requirements via the
QualityNet Secure Portal.
Shatterproof Receives Funding to Identify Ways to Improve Coverage for Addiction Treatment
The Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics recently awarded funding to Shatterproof so the advocacy organization can identify strategies for insurance carriers to improve coverage for evidence-based addiction treatment, including the use of medications for opioid use disorder.
The strategies will be based on the
Shatterproof National Principles of Care.
SAMHSA to Award Opioid-Related Funding Awards
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) will award 59 grants to state governments for prevention, treatment and recovery efforts for opioid use disorder (OUD). Grantees of the program will use data to identify gaps in availability of treatment by geographic, demographic and service-level terms, and use evidence-based implementation strategies “to identify which system design models will most rapidly and adequately address the gaps in their systems of care.” The application deadline is August 13. Click
here for more information.
SAMHSA will also award 263 grants to supplement current activities for federally recognized American Indian/Alaska Native tribes or tribal organizations to increase access to culturally appropriate and evidence-based treatment of OUDs. The deadline is August. 20. Click here for more information.
We will not publish CEO Update on Friday, July 6 and will resume on Friday, July 13. For questions or comments about CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond.
