All States/Territories

This comprehensive manual from the State of South Carolina Department of Disabilities and Special Needs outlines the four basic components of the Quality Management Review and includes the protocols and quality measures that are used as part of this process. The PowerPoint tool and new manual are used together to train providers on indicators and changes made from previous years.

Ohio has shared its Scope and Deliverables for its Comprehensive Assessment and Review Tool (CART) project. This document outlines the deliverables and timelines for the development of a generic data entry tool that will be used by the various business units currently performing quality assurance activities at the state level.

The Topeka Independent Living Center developed this list of Quality Indicators to be applied to all their consumer-directed programs.

This recent Health Affairs article presents the latest program trends in the three Medicaid home and community-based services programs (waivers, home health, & state-plan personal care) and reports a national survey of cost control policies used on waiver programs in 2002. The findings show slowing annual rates of participation growth on individual programs, widespread use of cost controls on waivers including waiting lists, and the persistence of large interstate variations.

This database, developed under Maine's QA/QI grant, helps to organize program design and QM system information in a way that is compatible with both CMS's Quality Framework and Review Protocol. Once information is entered into the system, the database can generate one page snapshots of a state's QM structure. <br> Please Note: You must download either database to your computer in order to run.

This report outlines the annual Medicare Advantage capitation rate for each Medicare Advantage payment area for 2006, and the risk and other factors to be used in adjusting such rates. Attached is a spreadsheet containing the capitation rate tables for CY 2006, a spreadsheet which shows the statutory component of the regional benchmarks and the National Per Capita Medicare Advantage Growth Percentage. The 2006 national per capita Medicare Advantage growth rate is 4.8 percent.

The information in this paper supports the President's New Freedom Initiative initiative by describing how a state might use the Health Insurance Flexibility and Accountability (HIFA) waiver option under Section 1115 authority to improve access to community-based services for persons with mental illness. These services can include basic health care coverage, enhanced community-based supports, and provisions to encourage the use of employer-sponsored insurance (ESI).

This topic paper summarizes how states can use Medicaid to pay for most institutional transition program costs on a permanent basis as a result of policy change since 2000. It also describes how states are currently using Medicaid HCBS Waivers to pay for community transition services-temporary supports people need when trying to move such as housing deposits, utility set-up fees, and furniture.

Discusses options for combining Medicaid long-term care funding and expanding the scope of long-term care services. The call was organized in response to a need identified by a grantee and included states that were available and had relevant experience with the questions being raised.

Collaboration between state Medicaid and Mental Health programs has varied greatly across states and administrations. The purpose of this paper is to identify and describe the basic elements of successful collaboration through 1) a review of the literature on collaboration, and 2) a description of collaboration in two states. The state examples highlight the mechanisms through which successful collaboration occurs and describe the types of activities in which collaborating agencies engage.