Data

Many states are undergoing long-term services & supports (LTSS) transformations. The lagging economy & increased demand for publicly funded LTSS are placing pressure on state policymakers to find solutions. As a result, many states either have or plan to implement Medicaid Managed LTSS, with 12 states having existing programs & another 11 with plans for implementation. Many states used the economic downturn as an opportunity to balance services from institutional to non-institutional settings.

Organizations are assisted in enrolling seniors & younger adults with disabilities with limited means into the benefits programs for which they are eligible so that they can remain healthy & improve the quality of their lives. New features available on the site include fact sheets with detailed info about core benefits programs, a clearinghouse of promising practices, & a library of sample benefits outreach materials, webinar slides, & publications—all searchable by topic, state, & keyword.

Despite continued fiscal pressures on states, eligibility policies remained stable in nearly all state Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Programs during 2011. Moreover, many states used technology to increase program efficiency and streamline enrollment. The "maintenance of eligibility" requirement in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) played a key role in preserving coverage levels. Without it, more states likely would have limited eligibility or tightened enrollment procedures.

Enrollment in MFP continued to grow steadily with 15,818 cumulative transitions to the community as of June 30, 2011, a 33 percent increase from the end of 2010. The states reported 3,722 new transitions during the six-month period from January to June 2011, 9 percent more than in the previous six-month period. The report provides an overview of state MFP grantee progress on key performance indicators and challenges states reported when implementing their transition programs.

State aging & disability agencies are operating in an era of state agency reorganization, re-conceptualization of state government, & restructuring of long-term services & supports delivery systems & financing. Key elements driving continued change include the economic environment, ACA implementation, uncertainty in the federal budget particularly with the failure of the Congressional Super Committee, changes in state level leadership, & the 2012 elections.

The latest HCBS data from The Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured and the University of California at San Francisco analysis of The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Form 372 have been added and are available for all states and the nation for 2008. This website allows you to do an interactive search. Review the updated topics including total HCBS waivers, participants by waiver type, home health expenditures, and personal care participants.

Existing national disability-related survey & administrative data are limited in their ability to meet needs of federal programs & policy makers. One potential response to these shortcomings is the fielding of a national disability survey. This report was prepared to assess the need for developing & fielding another national disability survey data collection effort. It presents findings from one of the project’s major activities designed to review the disability-related information.

As state and federal agencies strive to meet the growing needs of people with disabilities while using fewer resources, better disability data are needed for monitoring and improving the health, economic status, and overall well-being of this population. The report identifies limitations in national survey data on disability and outlines a wide range of potential short- and long-term options for addressing them, including developing and fielding a national disability survey.

Using six states as examples, this report illustrates how the DD Network partners, working with each other and in collaboration with state developmental disability agencies and others, have positively affected the lives of hundreds of thousands of individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities - assuring their rightful place as full community members through advocacy, research, training, and programs that directly support individuals and families.

Two reports look at costs, services, characteristics, and impacts of the Work Incentives Planning and Assistance program, which aims to inform beneficiaries with disabilities about work incentive programs, help them increase employment, and reduce their dependence on benefits. The program is serving a select group of beneficiaries who are actively working, seeking employment, using the SSA work incentive provisions, and leaving the disability rolls at relatively high rates.