- ACA Implementation & State Health Reform
- Coverage and Access
- Federal/State Issues
- Medicaid and CHIP
- Population and Public Health
- Providers and Services
- Acute Care
- Assisted Living
- Behavioral Health
- Case Management
- Child Development Services
- Chronic Care Management
- Community Health Centers
- Developmental Screening
- Early Childhood Services
- Emergency Care
- EPSDT
- Family Planning
- Federally Qualified Health Centers
- Home & Community Based Services
- Hospitals
- Long Term Services & Supports
- Medical Homes & Health Homes
- Mental Health
- Nursing Homes
- Oral Health
- Preventive Care
- Primary Care
- Safety Net Providers
- Quality, Cost, and Health System Performance
- ACOs
- Adverse Event Reporting
- Care Transitions
- Comparative Effectiveness
- Cost Sharing
- Delivery System Reform
- Fraud and Abuse
- Health Care Workforce
- Health Information Technology
- Managed Care
- Medical Homes & Health Homes
- Medical Malpractice
- Patient Safety
- Payment Reform
- Performance Measurement
- Provider Payment Policy
- Quality Oversight
- Specific Populations
- Adolescents
- Childless Adults
- Children
- Children with Special Health Care Needs
- Dual Eligibles
- Elders
- Families
- Low Income People
- Parents
- People with Chronic Conditions
- People with Developmental Disabilities
- Transitional Youth
- Vulnerable Populations
- Young Adults
- Youth
- Youth in Foster Care System
- Youth in Juvenile Justice System
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Keeping Children's Coverage Strong in the Context of the Affordable Care Act: Perspectives from State Children's Health Insurance Leaders
With passage of the Affordable Care Act, the stakes for children’s coverage perhaps have never been higher. Children potentially have much to gain in coverage for themselves and for their parents. However, they also have much to lose in shifting attention, and in unintended consequences of reforms focused on adults. To examine the options for keeping children’s coverage strong in future, NASHP initiated discussions with CHIP program directors. This brief highlights themes from those discussions, focusing on key considerations for children’s coverage that NASHP and most CHIP directors believe policymakers should take into account in making decisions that may affect children’s coverage.
May 2012» -
Fostering State Policy to Support Integrated Delivery Systems: Summary of a Discussion Among State Policymakers and Delivery System Leaders
A group of state and delivery system leaders convened for a day long symposium during NASHP's 2011 Annual State Health Policy Conference to consider the potential of integrated delivery systems and effective policy levers to foster their development. This report comes from the symposium titled Fostering State Policy to Support Integrated Delivery Systems: Summary of a Discussion Among State Policymakers and Delivery System Leaders. This report offers invaluable lessons from the field to help state policymakers understand what it takes to move their health care systems along the continuum from fragmented to highly coordinated, addressing payment reform, health information technology, and innovative provider and service networks
April 2012» -
Shared Decision Making: Advancing Patient-Centered Care through State and Federal Implementation
Shared decision making (SDM)—a process that engages patients in a dialogue with their providers to help them select health care options that conform to their values and preferences—is receiving increased attention as a tool for improving quality and patient satisfaction, and addressing unwarranted variation in care. Building on NASHP's analyses of state health system improvement initiatives, this report reviews the definition, process, and rationale for SDM and potential roles of states in promoting SDM. The report and a companion document highlight state legislative, regulatory, and other approaches in Maine, Minnesota, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington. The report discusses the challenges of implementation, state strategies to overcome challenges, policy options states have pursued, and lessons from their experience.
March 2012» -
Building a Consumer-Oriented Health Insurance Exchange: Key Issues
As states develop insurance exchanges, their decisions have profound implications for consumers. This report covers three main areas where consumers intersect with the exchange. First are ways consumers participate in exchange governance, such as directly serving on exchange governing boards. Second is consumer input into exchange policy and implementation decisions, and the various avenues states are using to gather this input, such as workgroups, town hall meeting participation, and surveys. Third is the early planning for the consumer-serving functions of the exchange, such as navigator programs and the web portal.
March 2012» -
Public Insurance Programs and Children with Special Health Care Needs, A Tutorial on the Basics of Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program
This tutorial on the basics of Medicaid and CHIP is a collaboration of NASHP and the Catalyst Center: Improving Financing of Care for Children and Youth with Special Health Care Needs (CSHCN). The tutorial gives a broad overview of Medicaid and CHIP, the many different populations these programs serve, the changes they are undergoing as a result of health care reform and some options to help readers think about opportunities to improve services for CSHCN through communication and collaboration with Medicaid and CHIP staff. The tutorial starts with an overview of how definitions of CSHCN may vary by agency or program, followed by eight major topic areas and then recommendations for steps Title V programs can take to build successful partnerships with public insurance programs.
February 2012» -
Toward Meeting the Needs of Vulnerable Populations: Issues for Policymakers’ Consideration in Integrating a Safety Net into Health Care Reform Implementation
A 2011 Commonwealth Fund poll found that 98 percent of responding national health care opinion leaders believe that traditional safety net providers will still fulfill critical roles after implementation of the ACA. With the support of The Commonwealth Fund, NASHP formed the National Workgroup on Integrating a Safety Net into Health Care Reform Implementation to inform national and state policy development in addressing the roles of safety net providers in implementation of the ACA. This brief describes 10 overarching issues that the National Workgroup identified as ones that policymakers concerned with the safety net will need to consider in order to achieve health care reform goals, particularly for vulnerable populations.
January 2012» -
CHIP Dental Coverage: An Examination of State Oral Health Benefit Changes as a Result of CHIPRA
Oral health remains a serious concern for the health and well being of children, especially those who are low-income. However, with the passage of the Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2009 (CHIPRA), all children enrolled in the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) will have a base level of dental coverage included in their benefit package. This brief provides a summary of the CHIP dental benefit changes under CHIPRA and examines the states that had voluntarily sought federal approval of current benefits, or made changes to their CHIP dental benefits as of September 2011.
Additionally, NASHP wrote a blog post about the dental brief and CHIPRA dental benefit, which is on the Georgetown Center for Children and Families' Say Ahhh! blog.
Blog: Children's Dental Health
By Leigha Basini
December 2011
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Building Medical Homes: Lessons from Eight States with Emerging Programs
States are seeking to strengthen primary care through the medical home model to achieve better outcomes and lower costs. The eight states profiled in this report—Alabama, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, Texas, and Virginia—are at different stages in the development and implementation of medical home programs. The states have drawn on both well-tested approaches and innovative tactics to help primary care providers adopt the model. As a whole, their experiences demonstrate that states can play critical roles in convening stakeholders, helping practices improve performance, and addressing antitrust concerns that arise when multiple payers collaborate.
December 2011
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