Reports

The Sacramento Healthcare Decisions (SHD) engaged Medi-Cal beneficiaries in a project to identify their individual and collective health care priorities. SHD had beneficiaries use \"Choosing Healthplans All Together\" (CHAT), a computerized tool and interactive group. CHAT participants designed their Medi-Cal benefits by making choices from 14 categories of services, each with two or three tiers of benefits. Findings and policy recommendations can be found in this report.

Recent health policy shifts and practice changes have explored consumer-directed health care. The National Council on Disability decided to research & evaluate the evidence base in order to offer a clear picture of the initiatives strengths and weaknesses. This study includes a systematic review of the literature (both print & Web-based) on consumer-directed and -oriented care. The study also addresses questions and researches the variety of models, preferences, outcomes and cost-effectiveness.

The Real Choice Systems Change grant was awarded in 2002 to the Connecticut Department of Social Services. The project has two primary goals: 1) To build the capacity within the state of Connecticut to support informed decision making, independent living, and a meaningful quality of life for persons with disabilities across the life span. 2) To assist three communities in Connecticut to become models of support for opportunities and choices for persons with disabilities across the lifespan.

As represented in the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1999 Olmstead decision, our nation’s values and laws have moved to a point where states should be developing community supports and services with people, not for them. Yet many professionals were trained and agency protocols were set in motion in an earlier time period, when the current view was far from predominant. This research looks at how a sample of agencies within the State of Connecticut promotes self-determination.

In October 2003, the Connecticut Department of Social Services, in collaboration with the Real Choice Steering Committee, which includes Consumers, State agencies and the University of Connecticut A.J. Pappanikou Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities Education, Research and Service, received a three-year grant from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to implement CHOICE (Connecticut Has Opportunities for Independence, Choice and Empowerment).

Paying personal assistance services (PAS) providers competitive wages and offering them benefits is one of the keys to stopping abuse of people with disabilities by their PAS workers, according to a report from the Center on Self-Determination Oregon Institute on Disability and Development. The report details a leading list of strategies for assisting individuals with disabilities to prevent and stop violence.

Created in 1995, the In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) Public Authority makes self-directed services available to people with disabilities who need support in order to live in the community. Using statistics and stories, this report outlines worker supports such as a free handbook and newsletter, a widely used health & dental insurance program, information about programs and services such as the Earned Income Tax Credit and affordable housing, and steadily increasing wages.

The New Hampshire CPASS project identified system “gaps” that impact a consumer-directed long-term care (LTC) service model. Focus groups identified gaps in the personal care services system, services that are at the heart and origin of consumer direction in the State. This analysis begins with an overview of consumer-directed personal care (CDPC), followed by a discussion of the gaps identified by focus groups and initial recommendations to address the gaps.

Explores states’ use of “global budgeting” to promote a public policy of supporting consumers’ long-term care choices. Prepared for NJ policymakers, this report defines global budgeting in the context of long-term care, provides five state models, and offers lessons learned about determining what is “in the globe,” legislative and administrative language to advance it, and how it can be implemented. Funded by the NJ Department of Health and Senior Services.

This report provides analysis of NFT grantees annual reports (2002-2003). It includes aggregate data on the number of people who left or where diverted from a nursing facility, transition costs, length of nursing facility stay prior to transition, type of housing after transition, and age at time of transition.