Long-Term Services and Supports

Long-Term Services and Supports

Relationship-Centered Care: Empathy and Healing

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This blog post was authored by HMA clinicians
Margaret Kirkegaard, MD, MPH, and Jeffrey Ring, PhD.

Patient: I am anxious about my results, Doctor.

Doctor: Let’s take a look … Yes, you do indeed have cancer. I will refer you to the surgeon for an evaluation as fast as possible. You must have questions.

Patient: (Silent, in shock)

Doctor: OK, well hang out here for a few minutes, and our medical assistant will bring you contact information for the surgeon. We are backed up with patients today, so this may take a short while.

This brief exchange illustrates missed opportunities for healthcare clinicians to provide empathic relationship-centered care.

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Early Bird Registration Now Open for HMA’s 2017 Conference on the Future of Medicaid

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Health Management Associates is pleased to announce that Early Bird Registration is now open for our second conference on Trends in Publicly Sponsored Healthcare, September 11-12, at the Renaissance Chicago Downtown Hotel. The theme of this year’s event is The Future of Medicaid is Here: Implications for Payers, Providers and States.   

Featured speakers already include some of the nation’s most innovative healthcare leaders.  Visit the conference website to receive the Early Bird rate and stay up to date on the latest conference news: https://2017futureofmedicaid.healthmanagement.com/.

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HMA Completes Acquisition of SVC

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SVC, founded by CMS Administrator Seema Verma, is now part of Health Management Associates (HMA). The acquisition, announced March 13 by HMA founder Jay Rosen, was finalized late Friday, March 31. SVC now becomes HMA Medicaid Market Solutions (HMA MMS), a subsidiary of HMA.

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Celebrating Doctors’ Day at HMA

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March 30th is Doctors’ Day, and for most physicians that means a special lunch in the hospital cafeteria or a carnation on their white coat. But a few years ago, I hung up my white coat and made the transition to healthcare consulting. The questions immediately started. Won’t you miss seeing patients? What exactly will you do? Did you lose your license? That last one is my favorite. So what exactly is a doctor like me doing in a place like this?

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Loneliness is Lethal: Five Strategies to Improve Health Outcomes by Improving Social Connectedness

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This blog post was authored by HMA clinicians Margaret Kirkegaard, MD, MPH, and Jeffrey Ring, PhD

While most people would agree that social relationships improve day-to-day quality of life, do social connections actually provide a health benefit? The answer is a resounding yes!

In 1921, a remarkable study began tracking the lives of 1,500 Americans from childhood to death. It sought to track what factors in life — such as faith, marriage, pets and exercise — increased longevity. The most significant finding was that strong social networks mattered the most. The quality of social connections was more significant than the quantity.[1] In an interview with National Public Radio, lead researcher Howard Friedman notes, “We saw that over and above the number of connections and the frequency of interactions that when those connections involved helping other people, reaching out, being actively engaged to do things for others, that was an added bonus on top of what we already see as quite beneficial from the social contacts themselves.”[2]

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Nebraska Releases LTSS Redesign Draft

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This week, we reviewed the Medicaid long-term services and supports (LTSS) redesign draft paper published on March 7, 2017, by the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). The paper is the follow-up to a January 2016 DHHS concept paper, which identified increasing pressure on the state’s Medicaid LTSS system. The LTSS redesign paper addresses identified high-priority systemic issues in the current LTSS system, recommends longer-term system changes, and outlines a transition to managed LTSS (MLTSS). Nebraska has long been in discussion around a transition to MLTSS, and this draft redesign paper potentially puts the state on a timeline to begin providing mandatory MLTSS statewide to older adults and individuals with disabilities (Phase 1) as of January 1, 2019, with MLTSS to follow for individuals with intellectual or developmental disabilities (Phase 2) on July 1, 2019. We estimate the potential MLTSS population at more than 50,000 beneficiaries with annual LTSS spending between $800 million and $850 million.

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Save the Date for HMA’s 2017 Conference on Trends in Publicly Sponsored Healthcare

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The Future of Medicaid is Here: Implications for Payers, Providers and States

Sept. 11-12, 2017
Chicago, IL

Health Management Associates (HMA) is proud to announce its 2nd conference on Trends in Publicly Sponsored Healthcare, Sept. 11-12, 2017, in Chicago. The theme of this year’s event is The Future of Medicaid is Here: Implications for Payers, Providers and States and features as keynote speakers some of the nation’s most innovative healthcare leaders.

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Arizona Issues Request for Proposals for Arizona Long Term Care System (ALTCS)

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This week, we reviewed the request for proposals (RFP) issued by the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS) on November 1, 2016, to reprocure Medicaid managed care contracts for the Arizona Long Term Care System (ALTCS) program. ALTCS is one of the oldest Medicaid managed long term services and supports (MLTSS) programs in the country, providing integrated acute care, LTSS, and behavioral health services to individuals who are elderly, individuals with physical disabilities, and individuals with intellectual or developmental disabilities (I/DD). However, this RFP only covers the roughly 26,500 individuals who are elderly or individuals with a physical disability (E/PD); this RFP does not include individuals with I/DD, who are covered through a state-run model.

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HMA is launching a new blog

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Change is the new normal for healthcare today. The industry is in constant flux. Healthcare reform is prompting us to reimagine what we do and how we deliver healthcare. It seems many public, private and nonprofit stakeholders are taking different approaches, sparking a daily stream of research, studies and trends to inform your next move.

But who has time to sift through all that data? Keeping current with the latest developments alone is a full-time job. That’s where HMA can help.

You’ve counted on us for decades to provide clear insights into policy, programs and financing to get the job done. We provide counsel, research, whitepapers, webinars and weekly updates.

And now, we’re writing a blog.

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