Insights

HMA Insights: Your source for healthcare news, ideas and analysis.

HMA Insights puts the vast depth of HMA’s expertise at your fingertips, helping you stay informed about the latest healthcare trends and topics. Below, you can easily search based on your topic of interest to find useful information from our blogs, webinars, case studies, reports and more.

Show All | Blogs | Webinars | Weekly Roundup | Videos | Case Studies | Reports | News | Solutions

Filter by topic:

Receive timely expert insights on topics you care about.

Select Topics

191 Results found.

Webinar

Compassionate Overdose Response Summit and Naloxone Dosing Meeting

Watch Now

Join us for the Compassionate Overdose Response Summit and Nalaxone Dosing Meeting, a two-day summit where naloxone experts will build consensus on the definition of a compassionate bystander overdose response.

Day 1 (March 18) is invitation-only for a small group of researchers, people with lived experience of overdose, those who have reversed multiple overdoses, and medical providers tasked with drafting an issue brief that will be the basis for the remainder of the summit.

Day 2 (March 19) will be an open virtual summit. On this day, we will share the issue brief with the audience for feedback and host multiple presentations that will cover emerging research on this topic, including:

  • The impact of different naloxone doses and formulations on people who receive them
  • The role of oxygen in community overdose response
  • Communication strategies for bystander overdose response steps

Our objectives include:

  1. Center harm reduction experiences and community voices in the national dialogue on overdose response and drive a narrative that is grounded in harm reduction values and compassion for the person experiencing an overdose
  2. Generate communication strategies that help those working in overdose response advocate for their program needs
  3. Create a written product that sustains the event’s conclusions
Webinar

Webinar replay: Substance Use Disorder (SUD) Ecosystem of Care: Pivoting to Save Lives – Part 1

Watch Now

This webinar was held on March 14, 2024. 

This was part 1 of our 4-part webinar series, “Substance Use Disorder Ecosystem of Care: Pivoting to Save Lives.”  In this session, we provided an overview of the series and took a look at the services and support that comprise a system of care for people who are not yet in treatment. These services are often community-based and involve outreach, engagement, and meeting people where they are. As people enter treatment, experience relapse, or choose to move through different treatment modalities, health promotion and harm reduction can serve as a safety net to keep people continuously engaged.

Learning Objectives:

  • Explain the differences between prevention, promotion, and harm reduction.
  • Illustrate the primary goal of health promotion.
  • Distinguish the continuum and role of health promotion related to stages of chronic disease: active, controlled, and relapse.
  • Identify role of harm reduction as a health promotion activity in the public sector v. the harm reduction often carried out in CBO/non-profit sector.

Whether you are a healthcare professional, caregiver, or someone personally affected by substance use, this webinar offered a roadmap for navigating the complexities of the Substance Use Care Continuum, fostering hope and resilience in the pursuit of sustained well-being.

To view all webinars in the series, click here.

Webinar

Webinar replay – Navigating change: exploring the opportunities of New York’s 1115 Medicaid waiver amendment

Watch Now

This webinar was held on January 24, 2024.

During this webinar, HMA panel guides you through the key provisions of the newly approved New York 1115 Medicaid waiver amendment. This groundbreaking development opens doors to transformative changes in healthcare delivery, impacting both providers and beneficiaries alike, including enhanced Health Related Social Needs (HRSN) benefits, workforce and hospital investments, and further commitment to Value Based Payment (VBP).

Gain valuable insights into the innovative strategies and opportunities presented by the waiver amendment, paving the way for new social care networking activities, funding opportunities, and regulatory flexibilities that will improve access to vital services.

Learning Objectives

  • Learn more about the waiver-specific details and what they mean.
  • Hear what potential opportunities will become available.
  • Hear from national experts on similar models implemented nationally.
Webinar

Webinar replay: collaborating to improve children’s behavioral health – a comprehensive playbook to fostering wellbeing in children

Watch Now

This webinar was held on December 12, 2023. 

Beyond the statistics lie the stories of countless children and families needing immediate and critical access to behavioral health services and community-based supports. Addressing these issues requires comprehensive cross-system reforms, including policies that promote integrated financing, enhanced care coordination, increased provider collaboration, and bolster upstream prevention efforts. HMA is working with these national partner organizations to prioritize and focus on cross system integrated and interoperable solutions to address the needs of children, youth, and families with complex behavioral health needs.

HMA hosted a webinar in partnership with the National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors (NASMHPD), National Association of Medicaid Directors (NAMD), Child Welfare League of America (CWLA), American Public Human Services Association (APHSA), and with support from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Casey Family Programs and other funders. Together, these organizations have developed a multi-state policy lab to be held in February 2024. Applications for state agency participation opened the week of November 11th. State agency decision makers can click here to fill out and submit your state agency’s application. This webinar focused on the overall effort and for states to hear from this partnership on the importance of collaborating to strengthen the children’s behavioral health system.

If the link above (https://healthmanagement.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_9YwdBb5xJzIVfIq) to the online form causes problems or does not work for you, please use this fillable PDF application and send it to [email protected] with all relevant attachments. Applicants must submit the full application no later than 5 pm on December 20, 2023.

Key highlights of this webinar include:

  • Explaining the need to develop a collaborative multi-system response to meet the behavioral health needs of children, youth and their families
  • The opportunity for 8 state child serving agency teams to participate in the children’s behavioral health policy lab

Featured Speakers:

Julie Collins, MSW, LCSW, VP, Practice Excellence, CWLA
David Miller, M.P.Aff., Senior Operations & Project Director, NASMHPD
Sheila Poole, Vice President, External Relations, APHSA
Joe Ribsam, JD, Child Welfare and Juvenile Justice Policy Director, AECF

 

Webinar

Webinar replay: opportunities for state regulators to shape policy and regulation of treatment for substance use disorder

Watch Now

This webinar was held on November 2, 2023. 

Health Management Associates (HMA) offered a 3-part series of webinars looking at the effect of proposed regulations on delivery of opioid treatment services to the population facing addiction issues. In this third and final webinar, HMA consultants highlighted opportunities for state regulators to shape policy and regulation of SUD treatment.

New federal regulations encourage significant changes to how opioid treatment is provided, with the goal of expanding access and improving patient-centered care. State regulators will need to adapt their regulatory practices and work closely with Medicaid agencies and treatment providers so the new regulations can achieve their intended goals. This webinar discussed how State Opioid Treatment Authorities (SOTAs), licensing entities, and state Medicaid agencies will need to work together to craft updated regulations, facility licensing, and reimbursement practices that advance person-centered care.

HMA experts were joined by Allegra Schorr, VP, West Midtown Medical Group and President of the Coalition of Medication-Assisted Treatment Providers and Advocates (COMPA). COMPA represents New York State’s Opioid Treatment Programs (OTPs), as well as providers offering office-based medication-assisted treatment, currently providing addiction treatment to over 43,000 New Yorkers.

Learning Objectives:

  • New Regulatory Requirements – Overview of state rules around opioid treatment vs the new requirements.
  • How to Improve SUD Treatment Access – Specific recommendations on statutory and regulatory changes that could lead to more patient centered treatment options.
  • States Leading the Way – Examples from states that are leading the way to expand access and reduce stigma.

Other webinars in this series:

Watch the replay of Part 1 on Opioid Treatment Providers

Watch the replay of Part 2 on Opioid State Payers Aligning Incentives for Treatment

Webinar

Webinar replay: youth mental health access: school-based intervention strategies

Watch Now

This webinar was held on June 14, 2023.

The youth behavioral health crisis has resulted in a cascade of federal funding, advisories, and overall opportunities to improve resources to help kids. This webinar presented the Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) STEPS for Adolescents model, which is a low cost, high impact approach that empowers schools to intervene and support well-being and resiliency before students are in crisis, self-harming, or suicidal. Attendees learned how to fund and implement this approach to promoting mental wellness as a strategy to reduce the burden on clinical resources designed to treat mental illness.

Whether you are a plan looking to develop value added services, a provider looking to better integrate with schools, or a school team looking for new approaches, this discussion offered information about available funding, highlight research demonstrating evidence for the model, and offer Q&A with one of the developers of the DBT model.

Learning Objectives

  • Credentialing Not Required – Why DBT is a preferred model to address the youth BH crisis.
  • Ease of Implementation – How DBT has been adapted for current school personnel to deliver.
  • Financing Options –How to finance enhancements to school-based mental health services including, but not limited to DBT-STEPS-A.

Featured Speakers

Webinar

Webinar replay: opportunities for state payers to improve & align incentives for treatment of substance use disorder

Watch Now

This webinar was held on June 6, 2023. 

Health Management Associates (HMA) is proud to offer a 3-part series of webinars looking at the effect of proposed regulations on delivery of opioid treatment services to the population facing addiction issues. In this second webinar, HMA consultants highlighted opportunities for state payers to improve & align incentives so that providers can expand access to treatment enabled by new federal regulations that encourage patient-centered care.

Patients seeking SUD treatment stand to truly benefit from the changes presented in the forthcoming SAMHSA regulations. However, payers need to restructure the reimbursement model to incentivize person-centered care and allow opioid treatment providers to remain fiscally viable without putting undue burden on patients.  The change in regulations present a unique opportunity to advance value-based payment models in the SUD treatment system and expand access to treatment that meets patients where they are.

Learning Objectives:

  • How Payers Can Benefit – Understanding the opportunity for payers to close important gaps in current approaches to SUD treatment.
  • Innovation Inspiration – Learning from other programs to better deliver whole person care.
  • Tackling Challenges – Identifying the likely obstacles and how they can be overcome.

Featured Speaker:

  • Chris Regal, Director, Clinical Innovation, America’s Health Insurance Plans​

Watch the replay of Part 1 of our Opioid Treatment Providers webinar series.

Stayed tuned for information on part 3 of our Opioid Treatment Providers series: Opportunities for State Regulators to Shape Policy and Regulation of Treatment for Substance Use Disorder

Webinar

Webinar replay: Behavioral health: moving access to care and network adequacy into the 21st century

Watch Now

This webinar was held on September 7, 2023.

States, counties, health plans, and providers are asking how to meet the growing demand for behavioral health (BH) services. HMA teamed with experts to discuss these challenges at our recent Quality Conference where we crowdsourced ideas for how to redefine and measure network adequacy, examining provider selection, community need, and measurement.

This webinar reconvened those panelists to continue this critical conversation, shared feedback on factors that lead to “adequate” provider capacity, and discussed the impact of new federal network adequacy standards.

The conversation won’t stop with this webinar. We’ll use our continuously crowdsourced information and material for our BH workshop on Oct. 29, (the day prior to the start of the 2023 HMA Conference), making the connection between how large system reform in BH will shape how we think about network adequacy. We hope you’ll join us.

Learning Objectives

  • Understand widely varying state standards for BH network adequacy and metrics — and validity concerns about how provider volume is assessed.
  • Consider the true impact of BH provider shortage on care. (Reality check: we do not have enough BH providers and will not catch up at the current rate of training.)
  • Learn about treatment engagement challenges and the need to establish criteria for discharge or discontinuation of treatment.
  • Understand how extending BH workforce capacity with peer networks might ease shortage concerns.
  • Hear about Delaware’s challenges and innovations to build an end-to-end ecosystem of care, shifting toward a journey rather than an episode of care.
  • Learn about recent federal reform and new standards around network adequacy.

Speakers

Nazlim Hagmann, MD, MPH
Senior Vice President and Associate Chief Medical Officer, Commonwealth Care Alliance 

Rhonda Robinson Beale, MD
Senior Vice President and Deputy Chief Medical Officer, UnitedHealth Group

Claire Wang, MD, ScD
Associate Deputy Director, Division of Substance Abuse and Mental Health, Delaware State Department of Health and Social Services

Webinar

Webinar replay: Medicare policy changes impacting behavioral health services workforce and population health

Watch Now

This webinar was held on September 12, 2023. 

Continuing our discussion from Part 1 of this series, recent rule changes proposed by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) will enable regulatory and statutory expansion of behavioral health services and providers. This webinar focused on how those changes will impact the already strained workforce, and the corresponding impacts on population health, value-based care, and the needs of special populations. Experts dove deeper into approaches health systems may adopt to handle workforce shortages while expanding access.

Learning Objectives:

  • Understand how CMS rule updates on behavioral health services will help expand needed care for Medicare recipients and dual eligible populations.
  • Create strategies for addressing the 2023 CMS rule updates to benefit employers and delivery systems toward improving whole health outcomes and reducing behavioral health workforce shortages.
Webinar

Webinar replay: Medicaid 1115 justice waivers and special populations: meeting the needs of justice-involved youth

Watch Now

This webinar was held on August 17, 2023. 

HMA’s webinar series, 1115 Medicaid Justice Demonstration Waivers: Bridging Healthcare, focused on helping stakeholders optimize care for persons in carceral settings and during their transition back to the community.

Youth in juvenile correctional settings often have complex medical, behavioral health, developmental, social, and legal needs. Many youth have been exposed to adverse childhood experiences, unsupervised home environments and have lacked access to behavioral health services. Transitioning youth from correctional facilities require high quality transition planning services for successful reentry into the community.  Part 5 of this webinar series delved into the types of care and services needed for youth, so that a whole-person approach can be applied to facilitate successful reentry to the community.

Learning objectives:

  • Understand the unique needs of juveniles in correctional settings
  • Discuss opportunities under CMS State Medicaid Director Level 1115 guidance to support reentry for justice involved youth
  • Discuss effective state models for justice-involved youth
  • Learn how to create a whole-person approach to health needs of juveniles in the justice setting

Other webinars in this series:

Webinar

Webinar replay: new tools for Medicare policy changes impacting behavioral health services

Watch Now

This webinar was held on July 26, 2023.

In light of the recent Medicare regulatory and statutory expansion of behavioral health services and providers, this webinar focused on how those changes will impact the demand, delivery, and availability of behavioral health services. Experts covered how changes in Medicare coverage will affect different behavioral health provider types, improve access to opioid/SUD treatment, and improve flexibility with telehealth/digital service delivery. At a time when behavioral health access is strained, and workforce shortages are reported nation-wide, this new Medicare coverage (expected rules to be announced soon) presents both a significant opportunity as well as a challenge to the delivery system.

Learning Objectives:

  • Understand the recent Medicare regulatory and statutory changes impacting behavioral health providers, services, and reimbursement.
  • Anticipate changes in demand for behavioral health services and the impact on your local market.
  • Plan for the impact of regulation changes on demand for opioid/SUD treatment and telehealth/digital service delivery.
Webinar

Webinar replay: Medicaid 1115 justice waiver opportunities- medication assisted treatment for substance use disorder in carceral settings

Watch Now

This webinar was held on July 13, 2023.

HMA’s webinar series, 1115 Medicaid Justice Demonstration Waivers: Bridging Healthcare, focuses on helping stakeholders optimize care for persons in carceral settings and during their transition back to the community.

Part 4 focused on access to medication assisted treatment (MAT) for substance use disorder (SUD) during and after transition from a carceral setting into the community, to ensure continuity of care for those leaving incarceration to reduce overdose and recidivism.

Learning Objectives:

  • MAT Trends: Understand benefits of MAT for incarcerated individuals and related risk management for correctional facilities, providers, counties, and health plans.
  • Building Connections to Community-Based SUD Care: Discover approaches to release planning for successful community re-entry for those on MAT to support recovery and reduce recidivism.
  • Integrated and Coordinated Care: Understand the role of community-based and health plan care managers and persons with lived experience in supporting access to MAT and successful community re-entry.

Other webinars in this series:

Watch a replay of Part 1: Medicaid Authority and Opportunity to Build New Programs for Justice-Involved Individuals

Watch a replay of Part 2: 1115 Justice Waivers to Improve Carceral Healthcare Delivery Information

Watch a replay of Part 3: 1115 Justice Waivers: Connecting Community Partners to Improve Transitions of Care

Save the Date – Thursday August 17, 2023, 2 p.m. ET: Part 5: 1115 Justice Waivers and Special Populations: Meeting the Needs of Justice-Impacted Youth