Committed to improving the health and well-being of all people across every state.

Respite Care

Woman embraces her mother, who is in a wheelchair

NASHP, in partnership with the ARCH National Respite Network and Resource Center and with support from the U.S. Administration for Community Living, is collaborating on a four-year project to promote best practices and build state capacity for respite care. The goal of this project is to support and foster state and national efforts, including those of the RAISE Advisory Council, to increase access to respite for family caregivers by:

  • Developing, testing, and scaling a respite workforce recruitment, training, and retention program
  • Hosting a Respite Summit to disseminate state best practices for increasing respite service access and to facilitate a federal-state dialogue to implement respite actions within the National Strategy to Support Family Caregivers
  • Conducting state scans on respite and direct care workforce policy activity
  • Featuring case studies and promising practices

Emerging Respite Care Strategies

NASHP interviewed administrators from seven states that are taking innovative approaches to administering respite care. Our findings offer key insights on how states currently deliver respite care — and emerging strategies that other states can replicate to increase respite service access.

This webinar highlighted key takeaways from a new NASHP report that explores emerging respite care strategies within Medicaid home and community-based services waivers serving older adults and adults with physical disabilities. Kentucky and Virginia Medicaid officials outlined respite care policies that increase service access within their states, with a particular focus on how other states can replicate.

This blog explores Maine’s two-year respite care pilot that provides informal and unpaid caregivers with funds of up to $2,000 for respite care, counseling and training, legal and financial guidance, and assistive technology. Caregivers can also access services to help maintain their own health, such as occupational and physical therapy.

Respite Care and Adult Day Maps

NASHP published a series of interactive maps highlighting state Medicaid respite care and adult day policies, with support from the Administration for Community Living and The John A. Hartford Foundation. Family caregivers often ask for these services to give them a break or enable them to go to work. Medicaid is the major public funder for these services, but state policies vary greatly which impacts who receives these services, the amount of services provided, and how much is spent on them.

To find out about respite care and adult day policies within Medicaid in each state, check out the maps linked below.

The first map in this series finds that respite service caps vary greatly among home and-community based service waivers.

Our second map in this series finds that state respite care spending is low in most 1915(c) waivers.

Our third respite care and adult day map finds that some states with Medicaid managed long-term services and supports (MLTSS) specifically give managed care organizations greater flexibility to expand respite coverage.

This blog summarizes our findings from our 50-state research scans and map series.

Respite Workforce Pilot Sites

The ARCH National Respite Network and Resource Center and the Respite Care Association of Wisconsin, in collaboration with NASHP, selected sites to take part in a field test a competency-based and enhanced entry-level respite provider training and recruitment pilot.

The selected sites are in Arkansas, Illinois, Kansas, Massachusetts, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Wisconsin. Sites were selected for their experience, capacity, and readiness to take part in the pilot.

U.S. map showing respite pilot sites

This page on the ARCH website provides more information on the respite provider core competencies and the provider training and recruitment pilot.

Acknowledgements

This project is supported by Administration for Community Living (ACL), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as part of a financial assistance award totaling $942,520 with 75 percent funded by ACL/HHS and $312,845 and 25 percent funded by non-government source(s). The contents are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor are an endorsement, by ACL/HHS or the U.S. Government. 

NASHP would also like to thank The John A. Hartford Foundation for providing the non-government matching funds for this project. 

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