NABH Welcomes Rochelle Archuleta as Executive Vice President for Government Relations and Public Policy

Rochelle Archuleta has joined NABH as executive vice president for government relations and public policy, effective Sept. 6.

Rochelle brings to NABH 30 years of experience in the health policy, healthcare delivery system, and legislative arenas. During her 20-year tenure as a policy director for the American Hospital Association (AHA), Rochelle led AHA’s post-acute care policy team. In this role, Rochelle partnered with providers, policymakers, and leading trade associations on issues pertaining to the home health, skilled nursing facility/nursing home, inpatient rehabilitation facility, and long-term care hospital sectors.

These advocacy efforts expanded to include issues of common concern to all post-acute care providers and their hospital partners, including issues pertaining to Medicare Advantage and commercial insurers, as well as the Medicare program’s effort to create a new, unified payment system to reimburse the aforementioned, post-acute care settings.

“We are pleased to welcome Rochelle to our team,” said Shawn Coughlin, president and CEO at NABH. “Rochelle’s extensive work in healthcare policy, as well as her strong relationships with partner associations, will enhance NABH’s advocacy efforts—both with legislators and regulators.”

Rochelle is a research fellow in the Georgetown University McCourt School of Public Policy and is a former David Winston Health Policy Fellow. She earned a master of science in health administration and a master of business administration from the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Health Professions and a bachelor of arts in political science from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

NABH Submits Comments on CMS’ Proposed Medicare Physician Fee Schedule for 2023

NABH this week sent comments and recommendations to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) regarding the agency’s proposed Medicare physician fee schedule for fiscal year 2023.

In its nine-page letter, NABH proposed revisions to the “Incident to” regulations and offered a range of recommendations related to the 2023 conversion factor, telehealth, opioid treatment services, coding and payment mechanisms, adjustments to the rate-setting methodology for behavioral health, and more.

HHS-OIG Report Shows Medicare Telehealth Fraud Was Rare During Covid-19 Pandemic

A new report from HHS’ Office of Inspector General (OIG) found a very small fraction of provider claims for Medicare telehealth services during the Covid-19 pandemic may have indicated fraud, waste, or abuse of those services.
 
The OIG’s offices analyzed Medicare fee-for-service claims data and Medicare Advantage encounter data from March 1, 2020 to Feb. 28, 2021 and focused on about 742,000 providers who billed for a telehealth services. Examining seven measures on different types of billing, investigators identified 1,1714 providers whose billing for telehealth services during the first year of the pandemic posed a high risk to the Medicare program. Those providers billed for telehealth for about half a million beneficiaries and received a total of about $127.7 million in Medicare fee-for-service payments, according to the report.
 
“Each of these 1,714 providers had concerning billing on at least 1 of 7 measures we developed that may indicate fraud, waste, or abuse of telehealth services,” the report noted. “All of these providers warrant further scrutiny. For example, they may be billing for telehealth services that are not medically necessary or were never provided.”

NABH Annual Membership Updates Are Due Next Friday, Sept. 16!

Next Friday, Sept. 16 is the deadline for members to submit changes about their organizations for the online-only NABH 2022 Membership Directory.

Last month NABH sent its system members a message with a link to the association’s membership-update tool. To help ensure we have the most accurate information on our members, please use this tool to verify your system’s information.

NABH has added several new categories this year. The answers to these questions will help us provide a more accurate description of our diverse membership to policymakers, regulators, partner organizations, and the media. Please be sure to enter information for all your system’s facilities so that we have a better picture of our diverse membership.

If you need NABH to re-send the link, please contact Maria Merlie at maria@nabh.org. Thank you for your cooperation!

Sound the Alarm for Kids to Host Virtual Roundtable on Friday, Sept. 16

Sound the Alarm for Kids will host “Helping Girls Thrive: A Conversation Examining Trends in Girls’ Mental Health” next Friday, Sept. 16 at 1 p.m. ET.

The virtual roundtable discussion will examine the national campaign to raise awareness about today’s mental health crisis among children and teens and how to create change. Some of the speakers include Christina Bethell, Ph.D., M.P.H., M.B.A, director of the Child and Adolescent Health Measurement Initiative at Johns Hopkins University and Kelley Haynes-Mendez, Psy.D., senior director of the human rights team at the American Psychological Association.

Click here to register.

Enhanced NABH Denial-of-Care Portal is Now Available

NABH recently made enhancements to its Denial-of-Care Portal that are intended to make the portal easier for members to use.

A year ago, NABH developed the Denial-of-Care Portal to collect specific data on insurers who deny care—often without regard to parity or the effects on patients. Now the association has updated this resource to make it more user-friendly for members and also more aligned with what regulators need to identify parity violations.

The updated portal includes fewer questions, which will require less time for members to complete. In addition, all questions are now optional. NABH hopes this will make it more likely for members to share the data they have. Lastly, NABH has added a checklist of “red flags” that were included in the 2022 MHPAEA Report to Congress from the U.S. Health and Human Services, Labor, and Treasury Departments in January.

Please e-mail Emily Wilkins, NABH’s administrative coordinator, if you have questions about the portal.

Save the Date for the NABH 2023 Annual Meeting!

Please mark your calendars and plan to join us in Washington, DC from June 12-14, 2023 for next year’s NABH Annual Meeting!

Fact of the Week

A recent study of 175,778 Medicare beneficiaries found that receipt of opioid use disorder-related telehealth services during the Covid-19 pandemic was associated with improved medications for opioid use disorder (MOUD) retention and lower odds of medically treated overdose, JAMA Psychiatry reports.

For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond.

September is National Recovery Awareness Month

This week kicked off National Recovery Month, a national observance every September since 1989 intended to promote and support new evidence-based treatment and recovery practices, the nation’s recovery community, and the dedication of service providers and community leaders who make recovery possible.

During this past week’s Overdose Awareness Week, which concludes tomorrow, President Biden issued a National Recovery Month proclamation in which he acknowledged the more than 20 million Americans recovering from substance use disorder and highlighted his administration’s efforts to support recovery.

“This year, we secured nearly $22 billion from the Congress to support drug prevention, treatment, harm reduction, and recovery support services, with a focus on underserved communities,” the president said in his proclamation. “With the additional $4 billion investment from our American Rescue Plan, my administration is expanding recovery community organizations, recovery high schools, collegiate recovery programs, and recovery residences.”

For more information about National Recovery Month, please visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration’s (SAMHSA) website, and please remember to follow NABH @NABHbehavioral and on LinkedIn at the National Association for Behavioral Healthcare.

HHS Announces $47.6 Million in New Grant Funding for School-Based Mental Health

The U.S. Health and Human Services Department (HHS) this week announced $47.6 million in new grant funding opportunities through this Bipartisan Safer Communities Act to support mental health programs in schools.

Of that amount, $37.6 million is allocated for Project Advancing Wellness and Resiliency in Education, or AWARE, which is meant to develop a sustainable infrastructure for school-based mental health programs and services that promote the healthy social and emotional development of school-aged youth and prevent youth violence in schools.

The remaining $10 million is for the Resiliency in Communities after Stress and Trauma (ReCast) grant program, which helps assist high-risk youth and families by promoting resilience and equity in communities that have recently experienced civil unrest, community violence, and/or collective trauma through evidence-based, violence prevention, and community youth engagement programs, as well as connections to trauma-informed behavioral health services.

Nonfatal Opioid-Involved Overdoses in Emergency Departments Are Rising

The rate of nonfatal, opioid-involved overdose emergency medical services (EMS) encounters increased by an average of 4% quarterly from January 2018 – March 2022, according to new research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The findings also reported that rates increased across most sociodemographic and county characteristics. Researchers noted that monitoring nonfatal, opioid-involved overdose trends in EMS data in near real time can help identify where overdose affects communities disproportionately and direct equitable response and prevention efforts, such as increased access to harm-reduction services and connections to care and treatment.

Click here to read the full CDC report.

Reminder: HRSA Announces Funding for 2023 Rural Health Network Development Program

Both not-for-profit and for-profit organizations are eligible to apply for the Health Resources and Services Administration’s (HRSA) Federal Office of Rural Health Policy’s (FORHP) 2023 Rural Health Development Program, a four-year program to support integrated healthcare networks to improve outcomes and strengthen the nation’s rural healthcare system.

The FORHP will make 44 awards of up to $300,000 each as part of the program, which focuses on four domains: improving access by addressing gaps in care, workforce shortages, better workflows and/or improving the quality of healthcare services; expanding capacity and services by creating effective systems through the development of knowledge, skills, structures, and leadership models; enhancing outcomes by improving patient and/or network development outcomes through expanding or strengthening the network’s services, activities or interventions; and establishing sustainability by positioning the network to prepare for sustainable health programs through value-based care and population health management.

FORHP will hold a webinar for applicants on Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2022 from 2 p.m. to 3:30 P.M. ET. Click here for more information about the grants and here for next month’s webinar link.

NABH Submits Medicare Advantage Program Recommendations to CMS

NABH this week responded to a request for information from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) about the Medicare Advantage (MA) program and behavioral health.

In its letter, NABH cited a recent study that found MA networks included only 23% of psychiatrists in a county on average — lower than all other medical specialties. “Not surprisingly, MA enrollees with depressive symptoms report more difficulty accessing needed treatment and rated their experience with the MA plans as worse than in traditional Medicare,” the letter said.

The association provided information and outlined recommendations related to advancing health equity, expanding access, encouraging innovation to promote patient-centered care, and engaging partners.

Extended Deadline: NABH Annual Membership Updates Are Due Friday, Sept. 16

NABH has extended the deadline to Friday, Sept. 16 for members to submit changes about their organizations for the online-only NABH 2022 Membership Directory.

Last month NABH sent its system members a message with a link to the association’s membership-update tool. To help ensure we have the most accurate information on our members, please use this tool to verify your system’s information.

NABH has added several new categories this year. The answers to these questions will help us provide a more accurate description of our diverse membership to policymakers, regulators, partner organizations, and the media. Please be sure to enter information for all your system’s facilities so that we have a better picture of our diverse membership.

If you need NABH to re-send the link, please contact Maria Merlie at maria@nabh.org. Thank you for your cooperation!

Enhanced NABH Denial-of-Care Portal is Now Available 

NABH recently made enhancements to its Denial-of-Care Portal that are intended to make the portal easier for members to use.

A year ago, NABH developed the Denial-of-Care Portal to collect specific data on insurers who deny care—often without regard to parity or the effects on patients. Now the association has updated this resource to make it more user-friendly for members and also more aligned with what regulators need to identify parity violations.

The updated portal includes fewer questions, which will require less time for members to complete. In addition, all questions are now optional. NABH hopes this will make it more likely for members to share the data they have. Lastly, NABH has added a checklist of “red flags” that were included in the 2022 MHPAEA Report to Congress from the U.S. Health and Human Services, Labor, and Treasury Departments in January.

Please e-mail Emily Wilkins, NABH’s administrative coordinator, if you have questions about the portal.

Save the Date for the NABH 2023 Annual Meeting!

Please mark your calendars and plan to join us in Washington, DC from June 12-14, 2023 for next year’s NABH Annual Meeting!

Fact of the Week

Since October, the use of hashtags related to self-harm – such as “#shtwt, short for Self-Harm Twitter – has increased roughly 500%, averaging tens of thousands of mentions per month, according to a new study from the Network Contagion Research Institute and Rutgers University.

For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond

Extended Deadline: NABH Annual Membership Updates Are Due Friday, Sept. 16

NABH has extended the deadline to Friday, Sept. 16 for members to submit changes about their organizations for the online-only NABH 2022 Membership Directory.

Last month NABH sent its system members a message with a link to the association’s membership-update tool. To help ensure we have the most accurate information on our members, please use this tool to verify your system’s information.

NABH has added several new categories this year. The answers to these questions will help us provide a more accurate description of our diverse membership to policymakers, regulators, partner organizations, and the media. Please be sure to enter information for all your system’s facilities so that we have a better picture of our diverse membership.

If you need NABH to re-send the link, please contact Maria Merlie at maria@nabh.org. Thank you for your cooperation!

NABH and Partner Groups Ask HHS Secretary Becerra to Integrate Mental and Physical Health Within ASPR

NABH and more than 50 other advocacy organizations this week sent a letter to U.S. Health and Human Services Department (HHS) Secretary Becerra that urged the Biden administration to integrate mental and physical health within the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR).

Last month HHS announced that Becerra had elevated the then-existing Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response from a staff division to an operating division—taking the new name of the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response—in an effort to elevate ASPR to a standalone agency with the department, similar to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). HHS’ announcement said the change would allow ASPR to mobilize a coordinated national response more effectively and efficiently during future disasters and emergencies.

This week, NABH was one of many organizations that called on HHS to use this opportunity to integrate mental and physical health when forming a national response to such events.

“Therefore, with the elevation of ASPR within HHS, the Biden administration must seize this important opportunity to integrate our mental and physical health response in order to truly ensure ASPR is able to fulfill its mission to prepare and respond to health crises,” the organizations wrote in their letter to Becerra. “Needed steps include having senior positions within ASPR dedicated to ensuring the integration of mental health and substance use into all of ASPR’s work, as well as broader staff training to ensure personnel have sufficient background on why mental health is so important to emergency preparedness and response.”

Click here to read the entire letter.

CEO Alliance for Mental Health Releases Updated Unified Vision for Transforming Mental Health and Substance Use Car

The CEO Alliance for Mental Health—of which NABH is a member organization— this week released an update Unified Vision for Transforming Mental Health and Substance Use Care for 2022.

Please read the updated vision, which includes information related to the national 988 behavioral health crisis line that launched last month.

Also, please remember to follow us @NABHbehavioral and on LinkedIn at the National Association for Behavioral Healthcare to share our posts about the vision.

HRSA Announces Funding for 2023 Rural Health Network Development Program

Both not-for-profit and for-profit organizations are eligible to apply for the Health Resources and Services Administration’s (HRSA) Federal Office of Rural Health Policy’s (FORHP) 2023 Rural Health Development Program, a four-year program to support integrated healthcare networks to improve outcomes and strengthen the nation’s rural healthcare system.

The FORHP will make 44 awards of up to $300,000 each as part of the program, which focuses on four domains: improving access by addressing gaps in care, workforce shortages, better workflows and/or improving the quality of healthcare services; expanding capacity and services by creating effective systems through the development of knowledge, skills, structures, and leadership models; enhancing outcomes by improving patient and/or network development outcomes through expanding or strengthening the network’s services, activities or interventions; and establishing sustainability by positioning the network to prepare for sustainable health programs through value-based care and population health management.

FORHP will hold a webinar for applicants on Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2022 from 2 p.m. to 3:30 P.M. ET. Click here for more information about the grants and here for next month’s webinar link.

Coalition on Physician Education in Substance Use Disorders Extends Submission Deadline for Curriculum Innovation Challenge

The Coalition on Physician Education in Substance Use Disorders (COPE), a partner organization to the Opioid Response Network, has extended the deadline for its Innovative Learning and Teaching About Substance Use/Opioid Use Disorders Curriculum Innovation Challenge to next Wednesday, Aug. 31 at 11:59 p.m. ET.

The challenge is intended to support teams of medical school faculty and students in integrating addiction medicine/psychiatry content into core clerkship rotations. It is designed to foster engagement and collaboration between addiction medicine experts, medical school faculty (clerkship directors or the equivalent), and medical students using cutting-edge concepts and training tools. Through a series of virtual conferences, winning teams will be led in developing addiction medicine/psychiatry curriculum and planning subsequent implementation based on the needs of their school.

Click here to learn more and apply.

Marijuana and Hallucinogen Use Among Young Adults Reached All-Time High in 2021

Marijuana and hallucinogen use reported by young adults 19 to 30 years old increased significantly in 2021 compared with five and 10 years ago, reaching historic highs in this age group since 1988, according to statistics released this week from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

The findings came from the Monitoring the Future panel study, which also reported that rates of past-month nicotine vaping, which have been gradually increasing in young adults for the past four years, also continued a general upward trend in 2021, despite leveling off in 2020. Past-month marijuana vaping, which had significantly decreased in 2020, rebounded to pre-pandemic levels in 2021.

Click here to learn more.

Enhanced NABH Denial-of-Care Portal is Now Available

NABH recently made enhancements to its Denial-of-Care Portal that are intended to make the portal easier for members to use.

A year ago, NABH developed the Denial-of-Care Portal to collect specific data on insurers who deny care—often without regard to parity or the effects on patients. Now the association has updated this resource to make it more user-friendly for members and also more aligned with what regulators need to identify parity violations.

The updated portal includes fewer questions, which will require less time for members to complete. In addition, all questions are now optional. NABH hopes this will make it more likely for members to share the data they have. Lastly, NABH has added a checklist of “red flags” that were included in the 2022 MHPAEA Report to Congress from the U.S. Health and Human Services, Labor, and Treasury Departments in January.

Please e-mail Emily Wilkins, NABH’s administrative coordinator, if you have questions about the portal.

Save the Date for the NABH 2023 Annual Meeting!

Please mark your calendars and plan to join us in Washington, DC from June 12-14, 2023 for next year’s NABH Annual Meeting!

Fact of the Week

About 6% of behavioral health providers and 29% of substance use treatment centers use electronic health record (EHR) technology, compared with more than 80% of hospitals that use EHRs, according to the Medicaid and CHIP Advisory Committee’s June report to Congress (see p. 84).

For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond

CMS Releases ‘Roadmap’ for Providers to Prepare for End of Covid-19 PHE

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services this week released a series of fact sheets and resources to help the nation’s healthcare providers prepare for the end of the Covid-19 public health emergency (PHE), which will also end many of the flexibilities the agency offered during the global pandemic.

A blog post from three CMS leaders noted that the agency learned from providers, facilities, insurers, and other stakeholders about what worked well—and didn’t—in relation to the agency’s waivers and other temporary measures.

“Expanding telehealth is an example of a congressional change,” said the blog post from Jonathan Blum, CMS’ chief operating officer and principal deputy administrator; Carol Blackford, director of the agency’s hospital and ambulatory policy group; and Jean Moody-Williams, deputy director of the Center for Clinical Standards and Quality. “The Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 expanded access to telehealth services for the diagnosis, evaluation, or treatment of mental health disorders after the end of the PHE,” the authors continued. “These services have been so important to the health and well-being of Americans affected by Covid-19.”

The post also noted that U.S. Health and Human Services Department (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra will give the healthcare community 60 days’ notice before the PHE ends.

Providers can refer to a host of fact sheets and resources from CMS in links at the end of the blog post to help prepare as the PHE winds down.

CMS Rule Proposes Requiring Behavioral Health Quality Data Reporting

CMS on Thursday released a proposed rule that would require annual state reporting for three quality measure sets, including the behavioral health measures in the Core Set of Adult Health Care Quality Measures for Medicaid.

The Behavioral Health Core Set includes 13 measures: a depression measure under the Primary Care Access and Preventive Care domain; four measures related to individuals with substance use disorders including one related to medication assisted treatment; two related to the prescribing of opioids; and six measures related to individuals with mental disorders. These core sets are designed to measure the overall national quality of care for beneficiaries, monitor performance at the state level, improve the quality of health care, and provide a national view of quality.

CMS has proposed that reporting these measures—currently a voluntary practice—become mandatory in fiscal year 2024. Data reported in 2024 will reflect care delivered in calendar year 2023.

“The Medicaid and CHIP Core Sets of quality measures for children, adults, and health home services are key to promoting health equity,” CMS Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure said in an announcement. “They will allow us not only to identify health disparities but also to implement interventions based on the very data that make those disparities clear.”

In addition to the Child and Adult Core Sets, CMS has proposed establishing reporting requirements for states that elect to implement one or both of the optional Medicaid health home benefits under sections 1945 or 1945A of the Social Security Act, which will measure healthcare quality for states that choose to establish “health homes.”

Public comments about the proposed rule are due Oct. 21, 2022. The rule will be published in the Federal Register on Monday, Aug. 22.

New JAMA Study Shows Pervasiveness of Methamphetamine Use in Rural America

Findings from a JAMA Network Open study released this week show that nearly four of five people taking drugs in rural areas across 10 states used methamphetamine in the past 30 days.

Meanwhile, non-fatal overdoses in the past six months were higher among people using both methamphetamines and opioids (22%), compared with opioids alone (14%), or methamphetamines alone (6%).

“The challenge is compounded in rural communities that often lack buprenorphine prescribers: more than one-half of U.S. counties (53.4%) do not have a buprenorphine prescriber, leaving 30 million people in those counties without access to treatment,” the researchers wrote. “Similarly, rural opioid treatment programs are rare, leading to long driving times to access methadone,” they continued, adding that educational interventions are needed to train primary care physicians, who are essential providers of opioid use disorder treatment in rural America.

“For example,” they wrote, “contingency management training interventions could be adapted to support rural primary care practitioners.”

NABH Annual Membership Updates Are Due Today

The deadline to submit changes about your organization for the online-only NABH 2022 Membership Directory is today, Friday, Aug. 19.

Last month NABH sent its system members a message with a link to the association’s membership-update tool. To help ensure we have the most accurate information on our members, please use this tool to verify your system’s information.

NABH has added several new categories this year. The answers to these questions will help us provide a more accurate description of our diverse membership to policymakers, regulators, partner organizations, and the media. Please be sure to enter information for all your system’s facilities so that we have a better picture of our diverse membership.

If you need assistance, please contact Maria Merlie at maria@nabh.org. Thank you!

Enhanced NABH Denial-of-Care Portal is Now Available

NABH recently made enhancements to its Denial-of-Care Portal that are intended to make the portal easier for members to use.

A year ago, NABH developed the Denial-of-Care Portal to collect specific data on insurers who deny care—often without regard to parity or the effects on patients. Now the association has updated this resource to make it more user-friendly for members and also more aligned with what regulators need to identify parity violations.

The updated portal includes fewer questions, which will require less time for members to complete. In addition, all questions are now optional. NABH hopes this will make it more likely for members to share the data they have. Lastly, NABH has added a checklist of “red flags” that were included in the 2022 MHPAEA Report to Congress from the U.S. Health and Human Services, Labor, and Treasury Departments in January.

Please e-mail Emily Wilkins, NABH’s administrative coordinator, if you have questions about the portal.

Save the Date for the NABH 2023 Annual Meeting!

Please mark your calendars and plan to join us in Washington, DC from June 12-14, 2023 for next year’s NABH Annual Meeting!

Fact of the Week

A new study in The Lancet Psychiatry shows that up to two years after Covid-19 infection, the risk of developing conditions such as psychosis, dementia, brain fog, and seizures is still higher than after other respiratory infections; however, the findings also showed that while anxiety and depression are more common soon after a Covid-19 diagnosis, the mood orders are transient, becoming no more likely after the two months than following similar infections, such as the flu. To learn more, read this story in STAT.

For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond