Advocates

Medicare Advantage (MA) plans have gained flexibility to offer a wide range of new supplemental benefits and to target benefits to members with specific conditions and individual need. This data insight provides an analysis of non-medical supplemental benefit growth since 2020, and focuses on the following: Special Supplemental Benefits for the Chronically Ill (SSBCI), which first became available in 2020 through the passage of the CHRONIC Care Act and a set of five Expanded Primarily Health-Related Benefits (EPHRB), which first became available in 2019 after the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) expanded the definition of what could be considered “primarily health-related."

The majority of individuals who need long-term services and supports (LTSS) in the United States rely on unpaid assistance from family and friends. The economic value of the unpaid care they provide is estimated to be over $470 billion annually. Unmet needs and waiting lists for Medicaid Home and Community Based Services (HCBS) place significant strain on individuals with disabilities and their families. This report explores how increasing access to HCBS services can reduce out-of-pocket costs for families and strengthen employment and financial wellbeing of family caregivers.

The impact of COVID-19 on nursing facility residents and staff has brought increased attention to existing workforce issues that affect care quality and safety, including staffing shortages and high turnover rates. This analysis presents the most recent national and state-level data on nursing facility-reported staff shortages and describes the Biden Administration’s new policy initiatives to address issues in nursing facilities. National staff shortage trend data spans from May 2020, the first month when nursing facilities were required to report COVID-19 facility data to the CDC, through March 20, 2022, the most recent week of data available.

The Biden-Harris Administration has announced that more than 59 million Americans with Medicare Part B, including those enrolled in a Medicare Advantage plan, now have access to Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved, authorized, or cleared over-the-counter COVID-19 tests at no cost. People with Medicare can get up to eight tests per month from participating pharmacies and health care providers for the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The SSA has launched a new online tool to help individals declare interest in applying for Supplemental Security Income (SSI). Applicants and individuals assisting applicants can now use this tool to request an appointment to apply for SSI benefits. An individual only needs to provide basic information to make the online request. The SSA will then schedule an appointment to apply for benefits by phone and send notification of the appointment within 7-14 business days.

CMS has announced it will offer more than $110 million to expand access to home and community-based services (HCBS) through Medicaid’s Money Follows the Person (MFP) program. The new Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) makes individual awards of up to $5 million available for more than 20 states and territories not currently participating in MFP. These funds will support initial planning and implementation to get the state/territory programs off the ground, which would ensure more people with Medicaid can receive high-quality, cost-effective, person-centered services in a setting they choose.

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many providers to transition to telehealth when it became the only way patients could access health services. Medicaid agencies now have an opportunity to support phone-based telemedicine in primary care beyond the pandemic, and many are already doing so. This blog post explores strategies that Medicaid agencies can use to suport audio-only telehealth moving forward, including extending payment parity for telehealth visits and using value-based payment models.

The DOT announced that it is publishing a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that would improve the accessibility of lavatories for people with disabilities traveling on new single-aisle aircraft. DOT encourages members of the public and interested parties to submit comments on the NRPM. Comments are due by Friday, May 27, 2022.

NCOA's Boost Your Budget Week is an annual campaign to educate low-income older adults about money-saving benefits. From April 11-15, 2022 NCOA will be encouraging older adults to see if they qualify for benefits programs to help pay for food, medicine, utilities, and more.

ACL is proposing to amend its regulations for the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR). These important amendments to NIDILRR's peer review criteria will allow NIDILRR to better evaluate how grant applicants conduct outreach and hire people with disabilities and others that have been underserved and underrepresented. The amendments also emphasize the need for engineering research and development activities within NIDILRR's Rehabilitation Engineering Research Centers (RERC) program.