NASW-NC and The Coalition meet with Secretary Wos
Wednesday, February 5, 2014
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Posted by: Valerie Arendt
NASW-NC and The Coalition meet with Secretary Wos
The National Association of Social Workers North Carolina Chapter (NASW-NC) and the Executive Committee of The Coalition met
with the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) Aldona
Wos and staff on January 22, 2014. The Coalition is an advocacy
organization for Mental Health, Developmental Disabilities, and Substance Abuse
Services. The group met with Secretary Wos to discuss priorities outlined by the three
subgroups of The Coalition.
The priorities presented were:
From Substance Abuse Federation
Ensure
adequate funding and state leadership to support substance use services along
the full Behavioral Health Continuum of Care Model
- Increase state-level funding for primary
prevention strategies.
-
Coordinate state efforts across divisions to enhance integration
of prevention services.
-
Improve and integrate information technology systems and collect
timely, reliable, and accurate data around performance measures and outcomes.
-
Increase state-level funding treatment
of substance use disorders.
Provide mandated enforcement of
federal Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act regulations
- It is of paramount importance that a parity
advisory committee be convened immediately, which consists of the Department of
Insurance, DHHS, and providers of substance use disorder and mental health
services.
-
Proper mechanisms for clarifying
enforcement authority and responsibilities, establish compliance protocols and
meet mandated standards requiring compliance documentation, and provide public
education about parity protections.
From Mental Health Coalition
Pilot Case Management
- Case
Management needs to be flexible, and it is especially needed to achieve the new
challenges of integrating primary and behavioral healthcare.
-
Our system
has gotten incredibly complex, and perhaps this is the very argument to
re-introduce case management- people need help finding the providers that they
need to help them get well.
Ensuring
people receive only the
services/supports they need, and are discharged or stepped down as their
recovery strengthens.
- The
incentives do not exist for the providers to phase out the provision of
services or to step people down to less restrictive services
Expand low
cost services that achieve effective health outcomes and wellness.
From Developmental Disabilities
Consortium
- Move to an
outcome based and flexible service delivery system.
-
MCO
Consolidation – complete in a timely, yet managed way to ensure least
disruption of services and the system
-
Standardize
Business practices and eliminate redundancy
-
Ensure more
individuals with IDD receive services
-
Ensuring
there are accurate assessment and resource allocation tools to assure that
people are receiving the right service at the right time, and improve budgetary
forecasting, moving the system to a less reactive and move proactive delivery.
NASW-NC staff member Kay Castillo serves as The Coalition’s
Vice Chair and Treasurer. The Coalition will continue to meet quarterly with
the Secretary and her staff to discuss issues from all three disability groups.
NASW-NC serves on a
variety of Coalition groups on behalf of NASW-NC members. For other Coalition
groups NASW-NC is involved in, click here.
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