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The NYSPA Report: New Medicaid Restrictions on the Prescription of Benzodiazepines
Late last year, the New York State Medicaid Drug Utilization Review Board (DURB) recommended new protocols in connection with the prescribing of benzodiazepines under the Medicaid program. Benzodiazepines, a controlled substance, are a class of psychotropic medication used to reduce symptoms of...
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Perspective on Recent Developments in New York State Behavioral Health Reform
Since the last issue of Behavioral Health News, as summarized by the excellent update above written by Dr. Jorge Petit and Jenna McCready, the State has moved forward to aggressively implement managed behavioral health. This article presents a perspective on some of the developments. RFQ for...
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Behavioral Health Services Critical to Success of Managed Care in NYS
As New York State implements healthcare reform, Medicaid re-design, and the integration of primary care and behavioral healthcare, substance use and mental health disorder prevention, treatment, and recovery services will have to play an important role if the hoped for transformation is to be...
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If Only HOPSTOP Could Map Our Route to the Triple Aim
Health care reform is driving consumer focused, outcome-oriented change in New York and across the country. In the past decade we have come to look at health care differently and our technology-based tools have grown by leaps and bounds. Game changing opportunities are surfacing in supporting...
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NYSPA Report: How Will New York State’s Transition to Medicaid Managed Care Impact Those with Serious Mental Illness?
Skepticism, not cynicism, will be in order during the coming year as New York State’s efforts to place all of its Medicaid enrollees, including those with serious and persistent mental illness, into Medicaid Managed Care Plans (MMCPs) is realized. Reaching this goal is an important part of the...
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The NYSPA Report: Medicaid’s Fragmented Formularies
To control the spiraling cost of medications to the NYS Medicaid program, the NYS budget adopted during 2011 radically altered the way the program purchased and paid for that formulary. The previously unified Medicaid formulary was fragmented such that each Medicaid HMO was required to define and...
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The NYSPA Report – Medicaid Redesign and the Public Mental Health System in NYS
In my last piece for Mental Health News I presented an overview of the attack on Medicaid, including mental health services, taking place across the nation. I expressed my belief that given NYS’s expenditures on Medicaid, which are far higher than any other state, reductions were necessary,...
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Mental Health Care Monitoring Teams
It is now known that some mental health care providers in New York City can fail some seriously mentally ill people. Some people try to get treatment and can’t. Others, who have been getting treatment in a program, are dropped without warning or apparent reason. Some people stop taking their...
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Editorial: New York’s Medicaid Reform Portends Major Changes in Behavioral Health Service Delivery
The 27-member Medicaid Redesign Team (MRT) appointed by Governor Andrew Cuomo in January made a series of far-reaching recommendation pertaining to the delivery of mental health and substance abuse services (taken together, behavioral health services). The MRT, comprised of stakeholders from...
