Psychiatric Disabilities/Mental Illness

The Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program provides financial support to low income individuals, including children, adults with severe disabilities, and adults ages 65 and older. This brief describes the SSI program and the demographic and economic characteristics of SSI beneficiaries. Additionally, it discusses state programs that supplement federal SSI, reasons some eligible people do not participate in SSI, and some current changes to the program.

This guide synthesizes the findings of a series of NGA Center for Best Practices action labs focused on state policies to increase disability employment. During the labs, state teams developed plans to better coordinate services to support workers with disabilities. This resulting document provides best practices on state policies and actions to improve employment opportunities and outcomes for people with disabilities.

This blog post by Edmondo J. Robinson, M.D., M.B.A., Peter J. Embí, M.D., M.S., Ramanathan Raju, M.D., M.B.A., and Yanling Yu, Ph.D. explores how social determinants of health have led to health inequity during the pandemic. Read the blog post to learn how health literacy and access to technology play a role in bridging the gap in health outcomes.

This issue brief presents early findings from the most recent KFF 50-state survey of Medicaid HCBS programs, focusing on state policies adopted in response to the pandemic, the pandemic’s impact on Medicaid HCBS enrollees and providers, and states’ early plans for the new American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) 10 percentage point temporary increase in federal Medicaid matching funds for HCBS.

The Rehabilitation Research and Training Center (RERC) on Technologies to Support Aging-In-Place for People with Long-Term Disabilities (TechSAge RERC II) published a new tool titled "Guidelines for delivering telewellness programs to older adults with disabilities." This tool provides guidelines for designing telewellness classes for older adults with disabilities and touches on design elements, such as software selection, safety, class organization and logistics, time structure and more.

In collaboration with the Partners in Care Foundation, the Aging and Disability Business Institute has developed a Health Care Outreach Toolkit that offers customizable messages and targets for community-based organization (CBOs) to use when reaching out to potential health care partners.

ACL is introducing a new blog feature intended to keep the aging and disabilities networks up to date about new policies. Visit their blog page to read about the latest policy advancements in the field.

CMS Office of Minority Health is recognizing National Immunization Awareness month by providing immunization and vaccine resources on their website. The site houses shareable information about available, low cost vaccines, Medicare coverage for vaccines, COVID-19 resources, and more.

NAMD spoke with Medicaid Directors and senior program leaders to understand where they are focusing their time as they continue to respond to the pandemic, pursue long-term program innovation and improvement, and manage their staff. NAMD has found that Medicaid Directors and senior leaders are currently focusing on program innovation and strategic initiatives, stakeholder engagement, program operations, staff management, COVID response.

Funded by ACL, this resource library collects digital materials from the Older Adults' Equity Collaborative member organizations to provide tools and guidance to the aging services network, providers, older adults and family caregivers. The resources included cover topics of social isolation and mental health, Alzheimer's and Dementia, disabilities, caregiving, retirement income and security, and emergency planning.