Long Term Services and Supports

This brief provides background information on characteristics of the MR/DD population and describes the major information and service needs of the MR/DD population and the existing supports and services system. The brief also addresses implications for grantees serving this population and provides additional resources to facilitate ADRC planning and operations.

This annual progress report calls on the Federal Government to be more creative in program design; be more accountable in measuring the impact of civil rights compliance for people with disability; and provide greater cross-agency coordination in managing disability programs. NCD has identified several important and recurrent themes that need to be addressed including: Program Design for a New Century, Accountability and Cross-Agency Coordination.

Louisiana’s Department of Health and Hospitals is currently advertising for a Director to lead its newly created unit for Aging/Adult Long Term Care services. Creation of this unit is part of an exciting, larger effort to reform how the state delivers long term supports and services to older adults and people with disabilities. The deadline to apply for this position is August 6th.

This Policy Research Brief reviews available research on the costs and outcomes of community service provision for people with intellectual disabilities (or “mental retardation”) and developmental disabilities, with a particular emphasis on residential services. It focuses on a number of key issues related not only to public expenditures, but also to funding systems, related policies and regulations, and their impact on service systems, on specific service types, and on service users.

Wisconsin launched a new initiative called Family Care that redesigns its long term supports system by concurrently reducing its complexity & increasing participant choice. One of its most groundbreaking features is the way it concretely translates into policy the principle of “money following the person” by creating for program participants an entitlement to both community supports & institutional care. This report looks at how the state uses single point of entry & person centered services.