May 27, 2014
May is National Physical Fitness and Sports Month. The President’s Council on Fitness, Sports & Nutrition is leading the way with lots of fun ideas for staying active, particularly for children. Click the image above or visit fitness.gov for more information.
In This Week’s Issue
Announcements
Trainings & Webinars
Funding Opportunities
SBIRT
Ask CHCACT!
Upcoming CHCACT Meetings
Resources
This Week in Health Policy News
Events/Educational Opportunities
Announcements
Access Health CT Twitter Town Hall – Wednesday May 28 from 1:00 PM to 2:00 PM, Access Health CT hosts its second Twitter Healthy Chat. This social media based question and answer forum is open to the public, and allows any interested individuals to pose questions directly to senior leadership at Access Health CT. Please join us via Twitter from 1:00 – 2:00PM and use the hash tag #AHCTchat to submit your questions and view responses. Access Health CT CEO Kevin Counihan will be on hand to reply to submitted inquires. More details can be found here.
Live Healthy Connecticut: A Coordinated Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion Plan for Connecticut - Official Launch. Wednesday May 28 from 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM, State Capitol Room 310. Event objective: To share ambitious yet achievable 5-year objectives and strategies to reduce the burden of chronic diseases while promoting health and health equity in Connecticut. Intended audience: A broad spectrum of leaders and practitioners interested in learning about and contributing to state-wide efforts to address chronic diseases and promoting health and health equity. For more information, visit the DPH website here.
The final seminar in the Health Disparities Institute Seminar Series will be held Thursday May 29 from 12:00 PM – 2:00 PM, presented by Dr. Adewale Troutman. Registration details and a seminar description is available here.
Enroll America announces open registration for its first-ever national conference, June 16-18 in Washington, DC. The conference, called State of Enrollment: Getting America Covered, brings together key health coverage leaders from around the country to debrief on the first open enrollment period and hear from experts on all aspects of outreach and enrollment in Medicaid and the new health insurance marketplaces. Registration and details are available at stateofenrollment.org.
Institute for Healthcare Improvement announces Leadership Alliance. Today’s health care leaders have at least two major jobs: Deliver great health care and high value today, and innovate for the emerging health and health care models of tomorrow. These are the goals of the IHI Leadership Alliance, an exclusive leadership initiative for ambitious health care system executives and their teams. For more information, and to register for the informational call Thursday May 29 at 3:00 PM, visit their website here.
Send us your success stories! How are the outreach and enrollment efforts going at your health center? How many people have you helped so far? We’d love to know. Please send your success stories to ask@chcact.org.
Tweet of the Week
Video: Learn about an exciting new #SNAP project from @uconnhealth at our blog http://t.co/TUOkcUh1HY
— CHCACT (@CTHealthCenters) May 21, 2014
Follow Us
New on Get-Centered
Our New Get-Centered Blog entry features a video with Josh Clauser of UCONN Health Center and their new outreach website, snap4ct.org
SBIRT in Your Corner
Three new Health Educators will be trained to conduct SBIRT services at Optimus and UCFS during the month of June.
And, learn more about CT SBIRT here!
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Trainings & Webinars
Special Enrollment Periods and Resources for the Uninsured Webinar: Thursday, May 29, 1:00 PM – 2:00 PM. HHS is hosting a webinsar for those who experience special circumstances under the Affordable Care Act such as graduating from college and losing health insurance, getting married and needing coverage for a spouse, losing employer insurance, or turning 26 and losing coverage on a parent’s health plan. More information and registration details are available here.
COPE (Collaborative Opioid Prescribing Education) for REMS. Prescribing opioids safely ultimately depends on the trust between prescriber and patient. Training can enhance trust by improving communication and collaborative skills. COPE-REMS is an interactive, self-paced, online training developed at the University of Washington-Seattle. This no-cost, online CME course is aimed at opioid prescribing providers—including physicians, registered nurses, ARNPs, physician assistants, psychologists—and other care managers who are involved in treating patients with chronic pain. Click here for more information.
NACHC is offering a series of webinars for FQHC and PCA staff dedicated to Human Resources every Wednesday, May 7 through June 4, 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM. The first in the series is called “Addressing the Challenges in the Credentialing and Privileging Process.” Registration for each webinar is open through Monday each week. Click here for more information.
CT Community Care, Inc (CCCI) is offering trainings to become leaders of Live Well Workshops, which teach individuals chronic disease self-management skills. Health centers are great locations for Live Well group sessions! Trainings will occur June 4, 6 ,11 and 13 in Wethersfield, from 8:30-4:30 each day. Contact Deb Smith at CCCI to register: 860-314-2205.
The CT Department of Public Health announces Programa de Manejo Personal de la Diabetes, a program designed to help empower Spanish-speaking persons with diabetes to build self-confidence and to better manage their diabetes. Training dates are May 29-30 and June 5-6. More information and requirements can be found here.
The CT Mobile Integrated Healthcare Summit will be held Tuesday, June 10, 7:30 AM – 5:00 PM at the CCSU Institute of Technology and Business Development in New Britain. Full details can be found here.
SAMHSA-HRSA Center for Integrated Health Solutions – Building Organizational Infrastructure to Treat Chronic Pain and Prevent Abuse of Prescription Medications. Thursday June 5, 1:00 PM – 2:30 PM. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention classifies prescription drug abuse as an epidemic. At the same time, more than 100 million Americans suffer from chronic pain, and many do not receive adequate treatment or the appropriate options for managing pain. How can health centers and other primary care safety-net provider organizations play a vital role in achieving the balance between appropriate pain management and preventing abuse of prescription medications? For more information and to register, click here.
Institute for Healthcare Improvement. Behavioral Health Integration: A Key Step Towards the Triple Aim. It’s no secret that behavioral health and physical health are inseparable — when patients have both behavioral health and chronic medical conditions they experience poorer outcomes and higher costs than patients with a medical condition alone. Integrating behavioral health and primary care is a key component of the Triple Aim, leading to better outcomes, better patient experience of care, and lower per capita costs, particularly for patients with multiple chronic conditions. Begins August 14, 2014. Details are available here.
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Funding Opportunities
REMINDER from HRSA: There are several critical actions you must take to ensure competitive Health Center Program applications can be submitted successfully. First, your organization must have an active SAM.gov registration at the time of application submission. Second, you must have an active AOR (Authorized Organization Representative) in Grants.gov that is approved to submit an application. As a matter of HHS grants policy, without a current SAM.gov registration and a registered AOR, your application will be rejected in grants.gov without further consideration.
Click here to view all of HRSA’s open funding opportunities.
Minority AIDS Initiative Continuum of Care Pilot – Integration of HIV Prevention and Medical Care into Mental Health and Substance Abuse Treatment Programs for Racial/Ethnic Minority Populations at High Risk for Behavioral Health Disorders and HIV. Application deadline: Wednesday, June 4, 2014. Click here more details.
The Office of Minority Health has released MP-CPI-14-003 to support organizations identify and assist minority populations, to educate them about the Health Insurance Marketplace (Marketplace) and to assist them with enrollment, completion of the application to determine their eligibility and purchase of health insurance offered through the Marketplace. Application deadline: June 16, 2014. Full details are available here.
The Aetna Foundation announces the opening of its 2014 Regional Grants Program – GoLocal: Cultivating Healthy Communities. This grant program will help to support initiatives that encourage healthy eating and active living, particularly within low-income, underserved and minority communities. Grants will be awarded for $25,000 and $50,000 over two cycles, April 10, 2014 – June 5, 2014 and June 16, 2014 – July 30, 2014. Visit the Aetna Foundation website for more information.
Ask CHCACT!
“Ask CHCACT,” a new advice column, will feature questions from health center staff, answered by your favorite CHCACT staff members! For the first several months, the column will focus exclusively on Outreach & Enrollment. Send your questions to ask@chcact.org! Ask CHCACT columns are also archived on the Outreach & Enrollment Resources section of the CHCACT web site. This site is now available to the public, with no log-in requirement!
Will Simmons answers this week’s question:
Will Simmons, Community HealthCorps Member, answers this week’s question.
Q: I missed open enrollment and it looks like I’m going to be uninsured all year, how much is the penalty going to cost me?
A:The penalty (technically called the “individual shared responsibility payment”) is calculated on a per-person basis, and there are two ways to calculate it. The IRS will calculate each of these for your family at the end of the year and charge you the larger of the two at tax time, unless you have an exemption. A few other things before we get to the numbers:1. You are charged for each person you could claim as a dependent who is uninsured (so if you claim grandma and she is uninsured, you pay her penalty);
2. The penalty is calculated on a monthly basis: If you are uninsured for 6/12 months of a year, you would pay 6/12ths (i.e. half) the penalty;
3. The penalty goes up every year.
For 2014 the penalty is the larger of:
a) $95 per adult, $49.50 per child: So for a husband and wife and their two kids, the penalty would be $95*2 +49.50*2=$289.00
OR
b) 1% of household income above the federal filing limit ($10,000 for single adults, $20,000 for married couples filing jointly). So an adult that makes $50,000 per year would subtract the federal filing limit: $50,000-$10,000=$40,000.00 and then take 1% of that for a total of $400 penalty for 2014Remember, the penalty goes up each year, and it goes up a lot! For 2015 the penalty is $325 per person (kids are half) OR 2% of income. In 2016 the penalty is $695 per person or 2.5% of income. So that family in example 1 up above would be paying $2,085 if they were uninsured in 2016!For a cool tool that can help you estimate your penalty for the next three years, check out this calculator from the Tax Policy Center: http://taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/acacalculator.cfm
Stay tuned next week when we’ll discuss exemptions and how to apply for them.
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Upcoming CHCACT Meetings
“Coffee and En-Rolls” – a bi-weekly meeting for Certified Application Counselors (CACs) and their supervisors, facilitated by CHCACT consultant Fran Freer and AmeriCorps member Will Simmons. Join us every other Thursday @ 9:00 am to share Best Practices and hear the latest news about Access Health CT and enrollment: 888-994-2509, participant passcode 519603#. (Please note new number). Upcoming dates: June 5.
All CHCACT Staff can be reached by calling 860.667.7820.
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This Week in Health Policy News
Here is a sampling of health policy news from around the state. If you see something in your local newspaper that you would like featured here in future weeks, please contact Deb Polun at dpolun@chcact.org.
Featured Stories
5.21.14 NACHC Blog: Health Centers the Focus at Recent Capitol Hill Briefing
State Health News
5.27.14 CT Mirror: State Regulators Did Little to Curb Aetna Rate Hikes
5.26.14 CT Mirror Op-Ed: Review of Children’s Mental Health Care is Vital
5.26.14 Hartford Business Journal: Independent Hospitals Weigh Strategic Alliance
5.22.14 CT NewsJunkie Op-Ed: CT’s New Health Database Needs to Trust Consumers
Health Reform News
5.27.14 Governing: IRS Announces Tax Penalties for Employers Sending Workers to Health Exchanges
5.22.14 CT Mirror: Access Health CT Update – Younger People Bought Later, Calls Still Coming
5.22.14 WNPR: Poll – Latinos Underinformed on Obamacare
5.21.14 CT Mirror: Six Ways Obamacare Exchange Insurance Will Change Next Year
National/Other Health News
June 2014 Governing: Dental Therapists Fill Medicaid Holes and Dentists’ Pockets
5.22.14 Governing: America’s Biggest Drug Problem Isn’t Heroin, It’s Doctors
5.21 The Atlantic: How Being Poor Makes You Sick
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Resources
Key Findings from the 2013 Kaiser Women’s Health Survey – The 2013 Kaiser Women’s Health Survey addresses a wide range of topics that are at the heart of women’s health care as a result of the ACA. The findings presented in this report examine women’s coverage, access, and affordability to care, as well as their connections to health providers and use of preventive services. The report can be found here.
The National Institute for Children’s Health Quality has developed a free, interactive Collaborative Action Now to Defeat Obesity (CAN DO) Playbook. Details are available here.
SAMHSA has released a helpful Behavioral Health Barometer. It contains data that you may find useful for grants and reports. It is available on their website here.
The PBRN Resource Center is pleased to announce the recent launch of a PBRN Playlist on the AHRQ Primary Care YouTube Channel. This playlist contains video recordings of national webinars hosted by the AHRQ PBRN Resource Center. The channel and all recordings can be accessed here.
ECRI Institute announces new resources for Credentialing and Privileging Non-Physician Providers and Staff. Credentialing is not just for physicians and other clinical providers. HRSA Policy Information Notice (PIN) 2002-22 states that health centers must credential any individual who is required to be licensed, registered, or certified by the state, commonwealth, or territory in which the health center is located. This list includes, but is not limited to, licensed independent practitioners (LIPs) (e.g., physicians, dentists, nurse practitioners, nurse midwives) as well as other licensed or certified personnel such as registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, physician’s assistants, laboratory technicians, social workers, medical assistants, dental hygienists, and nutritionists. The list should include locum tenens and volunteers as well. Click here to read their Get Safe! announcement and access their checklists and other resources.
The SAMHSA-HRSA Center for Integrated Health Solutions Telebehavioral Health Training and Technical Assistance Series is designed to help safety net providers and rural health clinics understand and adopt telebehavioral health services. The implementation of telehealth services for mental health and substance abuse allows for increased access to these services, particularly in rural or underserved areas. The 6-session training will provide health centers with the tools/resources necessary to identify and implement a telebehavioral health program. Learn more here.
The American College of Physicians (ACP) has launched a High Value Care Coordination Toolkit intended to improve communication about referrals between primary care and subspecialist providers. The toolkit includes a checklist of information that must be provided in a generic referral to a subspecialist, a checklist of information that must be provided in a subspecialist’s response to a referral request, model care coordination agreement templates between several providers and care settings, and an outline of recommendations to providers that can help them prepare patients for referral using a patient- and family-centered approach.
Birth to 5: Watch Me Thrive! – HHS and the Administration for Children and Families has launched Birth to 5: Watch Me Thrive! to encourage healthy child development, universal development and behavioral screening for children, and support for the families and providers who care for them.
Scope of Project Webpage: HRSA has released a new “Scope of Project” Page on the BPHC website. This page provides a “one-stop-shop” for Health Center Program Scope of Project and Change-in-Scope policy, process, and resources. View the new Scope of Project webpage.
New Rural Mental Health and Substance Abuse Toolkit Launched. The Rural Assistance Center, University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center, and the NORC Walsh Center for Rural Health Analysis launched this toolkit, designed to help rural communities and organizations develop and implement programs that meet the targeted mental health needs of communities based on proven approaches and strategies.
ECRI has developed Asthma Care for the Pediatric Patient. Asthma is a challenging, common, chronic childhood illness associated with significant school absenteeism, emergency department visits, and hospital admissions. Racial and ethnic disparities in both asthma management and outcomes put safety net populations at particular risk. This self-assessment checklist will help healthcare providers assess and develop a patient-focused asthma treatment plan.
Check out the This Week in CHCACTion! Resources Archive on the CHCACT web site here! It’s chock full of webinars and other informative resources compiled from our weekly bulletins. You can also visit a password-protected FQHCs Resources Library which includes a message board to facilitate communication across centers. To gain access to the FQHC Resources, contact Deb Polun, at dpolun@chcact.org.
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Events/Educational Opportunities
Click here to view our full events calendar. Click here for NACHC Seminars/Conferences/Webcasts.
Welcome to our new events calendar! The calendar is updated on a regular basis with upcoming events, webinars, educational opportunities, outreach activities and more. You can sort the calendar by category and subscribe to calendar updates by clicking here.
Agenda
Agenda
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