Arkansas

This article by the Assistant Secretary for Aging, Josefina G. Carbonell, describes how the US Department of Health and Human Services' Administration on Aging leveraged the investments of a number of private foundations and entered into a partnership with them to develop, test, and support the initiatives that were eventually included in the Bush administration's Choices for Independence Reauthorization Proposal.

This report showcases the findings of qualitative research that was conducted in Arkansas. The objectives of the research included: providing and overview of CCDE, identifying ways to increase referrals to the IndependentChoices program, and identifying professionals to act as ambassadors to the project. Research and findings are identified and discussed.

Arkansas developed this template for the development of spending plans by the participant. The plan allows for the calculation of worker hours as well as discretionary cash, transportation, assistive equipment and more.

This issue brief, developed by the National Resource Center for Participant-Directed Services, examines the impact of the purchase of goods and services on participants. The brief uses information collected from project staff and program participants from the Cash & Counseling demonstration.

A summary from the June 2001 symposium titled, “Independent Choices: A National Symposium on Consumer-Direction and Self-Determination for the Elderly and Persons with Disabilities”. Major themes and outcomes are highlighted based on the dialogue from the various speakers including policymakers, program administrators, consumer advocates, service producers, and researchers.

Based primarily on interviews with demonstration staff and other stakeholders, this paper draws lessons from their learning process on the design of basic features, in the Cash and Counseling demonstration programs. The lessons pertain to cooperating with existing service providers; outreach and enrollment; counseling and fiscal services; consumer spending plans and allowances; controlling program costs; and preventing misuse of the allowance and exploitation of the consumer.

This article describes the importance of examining views from multiple key stakeholders involved in implementing CD programs. The report focuses on the three background studies that informed the Cash & Counseling Demonstration and Evaluation, as well as results from the first year of implementation.

Implementation issues discussed in this article are centered around how consumers, providers, payers, and policy makers are affected by consumer-directed programs. The information for the report was gathered through interviews with twenty policy experts from the aging and disabilities community.

This report estimates the effects of Cash & Counseling on the caregivers who were providing the most unpaid assistance to adult beneficiaries when those beneficiaries volunteered to participate in the demonstration and completed a baseline interview. The caregivers in this analysis--identified by beneficiaries as their primary informal caregiver at baseline--were interviewed about 10 months later.

This report assesses the effects of Cash & Counseling on Medicaid beneficiaries' primary informal caregivers and describes the experiences of their directly hired workers. The abstract (free) and full report (subscription required) are available.