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Alabama’s Department of Senior Services (ADSS) launched a project to promote civil service by integrating AmeriCorps Members into its State Health Insurance Assistance Program (SHIP) and Senior Medicare Patrol (SMP) Program. This innovative means to increase benefits assistance and enrollment has proven successful, especially for programs such as Medicare Savings Programs (MSP). This report describes AmeriCorps programs generally as well as the positive results of ADSS’s AmeriCorps project.

HCBS.org NewsCLIPS highlights the important work related to Real Choice Systems Change Grantees. In each issue, we examine a topic related to home and community-based care by providing an overview of recent papers and publications. The Summer issues provides an overview of the reports available on the Medicaid Infrastructure Grant (MIG) Program. The goal of the MIG program is to support people with disabilities in securing and sustaining competitive employment in an integrated setting.

How has Utah used it's MIG grant to better serve its disabled population? The Mission of the Division of Services for People with Disabilities (DSPD) is to provide long-term supports and services. This handout summaries the agencies' goals, application requirements, services, eligibility and includes a separate section geared specifically to the blind and visually impaired. Written for potential clients, it can also provide a detailed outline of how any state could structure their own program.

This innovative disability and health data tool uses data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) to identify disparities in health between adults with and without disabilities. Find data on a range of health indicators for your state and compare the health of adults with and without disabilities and certain health conditions. Maps, data tables and state profiles are available.

This bulletin reviews policy when Medicaid funding is available for certain administrative costs related to activities conducted by state Long Term Care Ombudsman (LTCO) programs that benefit the state's Medicaid program. It also summarizes the basic requirements for Medicaid administrative claiming of LTCO program activities and provides a link where states and LTCO programs can find more information regarding specific program activities that may be eligible for Medicaid administrative funding.

This summary draws attention to some of the most important aspects of CMS’s recently released guidance for states and stakeholders on the use of managed care for long-term services and supports (MLTSS) as well as transitioning LTSS providers into managed care systems and developing MLTSS programs. CMS identified 10 important elements that should be incorporated into managed LTSS and this document can assist consumers and their representatives in understanding these elements.

This issue brief uses the most recent comprehensive data, from 2009, to examine the characteristics and costs of dual-eligible beneficiaries. The report also examines the different payment systems that Medicare and Medicaid use to fund care for dual-eligible beneficiaries and recent efforts at the federal and state levels to integrate those payment systems and coordinate the care between both programs. Given the high cost of dual-eligibles, legislative solutions are reviewed.

Few employer-sponsored and private insurance plans offer the range of services that workers with disabilities may need. Medicaid Buy-In programs are a viable option that allows these workers to receive needed services without spending down for Medicaid. This report describes findings from a study of characteristics and service utilization of higher-income enrollees compared to regular Medicaid enrollees. Providing these programs may keep higher-income workers with disabilities employed.