Behavioral Health Integration in a Medicaid Accountable Care Organization: Management Lessons from a Health Center.

Behavioral health integration, including as used in Medicaid Accountable Care Organizations, can improve care and decrease costs. Our model strives to integrate fully its medical, behavioral health, and substance use disorder services into one primary care clinic. Merged management has decreased wait times, improved billing, and enabled several promising innovations.

Assessing and Addressing Social Determinants of Health: A Key Competency for Succeeding in Value-Based Care.

There is growing recognition that social determinants of health influence individual and population health. A well-designed population health management strategy can yield improved outcomes for a given community, while improving the financial health of health care systems and providers. This article provides an overview of aligned care delivery, community engagement, education, technology, and other key strategies required to address the needs of patients and communities. A holistic vision incorporating social factors can lead to a return on investment and improvement in the health of a community, at the same time decreasing health care costs for the population managed.

Integrating physical health: What were the costs to behavioral health care clinics?

OBJECTIVE: To inform providers and policy-makers about the potential costs of providing physical health care in mental health clinics. METHODS: Cost data were collected through interviews with 22 behavioral health clinics participating in New York State Office of Mental Health's health monitoring and health physicals programs. The interview data was combined with financial reporting data provided to the state to identify per interaction costs for two levels of physical health services: health monitoring and health monitoring plus health physicals. RESULTS: This study gives detailed information on the costs of clinics' health integration programs, including per interaction costs related to direct service, charting and administration, and total care coordination. Average direct costs per client interaction were 3 times higher for health physicals than for health monitoring. CONCLUSIONS: Costs of integrating physical care services are not trivial to mental health clinics, and may pose a barrier to widespread adoption. Provision of limited health monitoring services is less expensive for clinics, but generates proportionally large non-clinical costs than health physicals. The relative health impact of this more limited approach is an important area for future study. Also, shifting reimbursement to include health care coordination time may improve program sustainability.

An innovative model to coordinate healthcare and social services for people with serious mental illness: A mixed-methods case study of Maryland's Medicaid health home program.

OBJECTIVE: We conducted a case study examining implementation of Maryland's Medicaid health home program, a unique model for integration of behavioral, somatic, and social services for people with serious mental illness (SMI) in the psychiatric rehabilitation program setting. METHOD: We conducted interviews and surveys with health home leaders (N=72) and front-line staff (N=627) representing 46 of the 48 total health home programs active during the November 2015-December 2016 study period. We measured the structural and service characteristics of the 46 health home programs and leaders' and staff members' perceptions of program implementation. RESULTS: Health home program structure varied across sites: for example, 15% of programs had co-located primary care providers and 76% had onsite supported employment providers. Most leaders and staff viewed the health home program as having strong organizational fit with psychiatric rehabilitation programs' organizational structures and missions, but noted implementation challenges around health IT, population health management, and coordination with external providers. CONCLUSION: Maryland's psychiatric rehabilitation-based health home is a promising model for integration of behavioral, somatic, and social services for people with SMI but may be strengthened by additional policy and implementation supports, including incentives for external providers to engage in care coordination with health home providers.

Integrating behavioral health under an ACO global budget: barriers and progress in Oregon.

OBJECTIVES: This study describes challenges that coordinated care organizations (CCOs), a version of accountable care organizations, experienced when attempting to finance integrated care for Medicaid recipients in Oregon and the strategies they developed to address these barriers. STUDY DESIGN: Cross-case comparative study. METHODS: We conducted a cross-case comparative study of 5 diverse CCOs in Oregon. We interviewed key stakeholders: CCO leaders, practice leaders, and primary care and behavioral health clinicians. A multidisciplinary team analyzed data using an immersion-crystallization approach. Financial barriers to integrating care and strategies to address them emerged from this analysis. Findings were member-checked with a CCO integration workgroup to ensure wider applicability. RESULTS: State legislation that initiated CCOs promoted integration expansion. CCOs, however, struggled to create sustainable funding mechanisms to support integration. This was due to regulatory and financial silos that persisted despite CCO global budget formation; concerns about actuarial soundness that limited reasonable, yet creative, uses of federal funds to support integration; and billing difficulties connected to licensing and documentation requirements for behavioral and mental health providers. Despite these barriers, CCOs, with the help of the state, supported expanding integrated care in primary care by using state funds to pilot test integration models and to promote alternative payment methodologies. CONCLUSIONS: Oregon's CCO mandate included a focus on better integrating medical and behavioral healthcare for Medicaid recipients. Despite this intention, challenges exist in the financing of integration, many of which state and federal leaders can address through payment and regulatory reform.

Assessing Changes to Medicaid Managed Care Regulations: Facilitating Integration of Physical and Behavioral Health Care.

Issue: As states consider how to effectively control Medicaid costs, many are looking to integrate behavioral and medical care, including long-term services and supports, particularly for individuals with complex needs. Goal: To summarize how recent federal regulations are encouraging an integrated approach to behavioral and physical health care. Findings and Conclusions: Two recent federal rules issued in 2016 are facilitating the transition to integrated care models: the Medicaid managed care rule and the Medicaid managed care mental health parity rule. These changes may not spell the end of fragmented systems, but they certainly do not support a status quo approach to care. While the regulations do not specifically address integrated care, they should facilitate and, in some instances, encourage, state movement to integrated care for Medicaid participants.

Minnesota Integrated Health Partnership Demonstration: Implementation of a Medicaid ACO Model.

In recent years, accountable care organizations (ACOs) have become more prevalent in the United States. This study describes the origins, implementation, and early results of Minnesota's Medicaid ACO payment model, the Integrated Health Partnership (IHP) demonstration project. We describe the structure of the program and present preliminary evaluation results to document the state's important work and to provide lessons for other states interested in implementing Medicaid ACOs. The IHP program has expanded in size over time, the state has reported significant savings, and evidence exists of capacity building among participating providers. We identify factors that may have contributed to the program's early success, but more work is needed to investigate the specific drivers of quality improvement and savings within Minnesota's ACO program and to compare the design and effects of the IHP with other Medicaid and Medicare ACO programs. We conclude with comments about the future of the state's Medicaid ACO program and situate Minnesota's findings within the context of the broader ACO movement.

How Arizona Medicaid Accelerated the Integration of Physical and Behavioral Health Services.

ISSUE: In most states, one agency has responsibility for Medicaid enrollees' physical health services and at least one other agency has responsibility for their behavioral health services. Apportioning responsibility for the physical and behavioral health of Medicaid beneficiaries into different agencies inevitably leads to different--and sometimes misaligned--policy goals, program priorities, and purchasing strategies, thereby impeding the delivery of integrated care. GOAL: To describe the rationale, process, and impact of Arizona's 2015 consolidation of its physical and behavioral health services agencies into its Medicaid agency. METHOD: The study is based on published research, Arizona Medicaid agency materials, and interviews with 34 individuals, including representatives from the current Medicaid agency and previous behavioral health services agency, health plans, primary care and behavioral health providers, consumers, the justice system, and the health information exchange. FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS: Consolidation has led to increased attention to behavioral health services and behavioral and physical health integration, enabled more strategic purchasing and streamlined regulatory processes, and enhanced communication, collaboration, and mutual trust across sectors. Arizona's experience offers lessons to policymakers as they consider how best to integrate physical and behavioral health services and ensure that Medicaid is an efficient and effective purchaser of health care services.

Health Care Data and Trends: Will Medicaid Reform Help?

Health care coverage has changed dramatically over the past few decades, with more focus on integrated health systems, innovative treatments, and technology. These changes have resulted in cost savings and improved health for many. However, we continue to face challenges in improving outcomes for those with the greatest need.

Assessing the impact of an integrated care system on the healthcare expenditures of children with special healthcare needs.

OBJECTIVES: The Children's Medical Services Network, a carved-out fee-for-service healthcare system for Florida's children with special healthcare needs (CSHCN), chose to develop an integrated care system (ICS) for its enrollees. The goals of this study were to analyze the effects of a managed care program on the Medicaid expenditures of CSHCN and to evaluate the performance of econometric models used to analyze healthcare expenditures. STUDY DESIGN: We used administrative data from 3947 CSHCN enrolled in Florida's Medicaid program between 2006 and 2008 for 2 treatment and 2 control counties. The 2 treatment counties were subject to the new managed care ICS. METHODS: To account for the unique nature of healthcare expenditures data, 5 econometric models were constructed. Using a difference-in-differences approach, these models were used to estimate differences in healthcare expenditures between CSHCN in the reform and control counties. RESULTS: The ICS program decreased outpatient, inpatient, pharmacy, and total costs. These effects were statistically significant for 1 of the reform counties. Emergency department costs increased slightly, though not significantly. Among the econometric models, the generalized linear models outperformed the ordinary least squares regressions. CONCLUSIONS: This analysis provides evidence that managed care programs such as Florida's ICS have the potential to reduce healthcare expenditures.

Faith-based organizations and the Affordable Care Act: Reducing Latino mental health care disparities.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA; 2010) is expected to increase access to mental health care through provisions aimed at increasing health coverage among the nation's uninsured, including 10.2 million eligible Latino adults. The ACA will increase health coverage by expanding Medicaid eligibility to individuals living below 138% of the federal poverty level, subsidizing the purchase of private insurance among individuals not eligible for Medicaid, and requiring employers with 50 or more employees to offer health insurance. An anticipated result of this landmark legislation is improvement in the screening, diagnosis, and treatment of mental disorders in racial/ethnic minorities, particularly for Latinos, who traditionally have had less access to these services. However, these efforts alone may not sufficiently ameliorate mental health care disparities for Latinos. Faith-based organizations (FBOs) could play an integral role in the mental health care of Latinos by increasing help seeking, providing religion-based mental health services, and delivering supportive services that address common access barriers among Latinos. Thus, in determining ways to eliminate Latino mental health care disparities under the ACA, examining pathways into care through the faith-based sector offers unique opportunities to address some of the cultural barriers confronted by this population. We examine how partnerships between FBOs and primary care patient-centered health homes may help reduce the gap of unmet mental health needs among Latinos in this era of health reform. We also describe the challenges FBOs and primary care providers need to overcome to be partners in integrated care efforts.

Growth of Accountable Care Organizations in California: Number, Characteristics, and State Regulation.

Accountable care organizations (ACOs) result in physician organizations' and hospitals' receiving risk-based payments tied to costs, health care quality, and patient outcomes. This article (1) describes California ACOs within Medicare, the commercial market, and Medi-Cal and the safety net; (2) discusses how ACOs are regulated by the California Department of Managed Health Care and the California Department of Insurance; and (3) analyzes the increase of ACOs in California using data from Cattaneo and Stroud. While ACOs in California are well established within Medicare and the commercial market, they are still emerging within Medi-Cal and the safety net. Notwithstanding, the state has not enacted a law or issued a regulation specific to ACOs; they are regulated under existing statutes and regulations. From August 2012 to February 2014, the number of lives covered by ACOs increased from 514,100 to 915,285, representing 2.4 percent of California's population, including 10.6 percent of California's Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries and 2.3 percent of California's commercially insured lives. By emphasizing health care quality and patient outcomes, ACOs have the potential to build and improve on California's delegated model. If recent trends continue, ACOs will have a greater influence on health care delivery and financial risk sharing in California.

You Can't Make Me Do It, but I Could Be Persuaded: A Federalism Perspective on the Affordable Care Act.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) seeks to change fundamentally the US health care system. The responses of states have been diverse and changing. What explains these diverse and dynamic responses? We examine the decision making of states concerning the creation of Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plan programs and insurance marketplaces and the expansion of Medicaid in historical context. This frames our analysis and its implications for future health reform in broader perspective by identifying a number of characteristics of state-federal grants programs: (1) slow and uneven implementation; (2) wide variation across states; (3) accommodation by the federal government; (4) ideological conflict; (5) state response to incentives; (6) incomplete take-up rates of eligible individuals; and (7) programs as stepping-stones and wedges. Assessing the implementation of the three main components of the ACA, we find that partisanship exerts significant influence, yet less so in the case of Medicaid expansion. Moreover, factors specific to the insurance market also play an important role. Finally, we conclude by applying the themes to the ACA and offer an outlook for its continuing implementation. Specifically, we expect a gradual move toward universal state participation in the ACA, especially with respect to Medicaid expansion.

Changes in use of autologous and prosthetic postmastectomy reconstruction after medicaid expansion in New York state.

BACKGROUND: With Medicaid expansion beginning in 2014, it is important to understand the effects of access to reconstructive services for new beneficiaries. The authors assessed changes in use of breast cancer reconstruction for Medicaid beneficiaries after expansion in New York State in 2001. METHODS: The authors used the State Inpatient Database for New York (1998 to 2006) for all patients aged 19 to 64 years who underwent breast reconstruction. An interrupted time series design with linear regression modeling evaluated the effect of Medicaid expansion on the proportion of breast reconstruction patients that were Medicaid beneficiaries. RESULTS: The proportion of breast reconstructions provided to Medicaid beneficiaries increased by 0.28 percent per quarter after expansion (p < 0.001), resulting in a 5.5 percent increase above predicted trajectory without expansion. This corresponds to a population-adjusted increase of 1.8 Medicaid cases per 1 million population per quarter. On subgroup analysis, there was no significant increase in the proportion of autologous reconstructions (p = 0.4); however, the proportion of prosthetic reconstructions for Medicaid beneficiaries had a significant increase of 0.41 percent per quarter (p < 0.001), resulting in a 7.5 percent cumulative increase. This indicates that 135 additional prosthetic reconstruction operations were provided to Medicaid beneficiaries within 5 years of expansion. CONCLUSIONS: Surgeons increased the volume of breast reconstructions provided to Medicaid beneficiaries after expansion. However, there are disparities between autologous and prosthetic reconstruction. If Medicaid expansion is to provide comprehensive care, with adequate access to all reconstructive options, these disparities must be addressed.

Accountable care organizations and the allergist: challenges and opportunities.

For decades, health care policy experts have wrestled with ways to solve problems of access, cost, and quality in US health care. The current consensus is that the solution to all three lies in changing financial incentives for providers and delivering care through integrated systems. The currently favored vehicle for this, both in the public and private sectors, is through Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs). Medicare has several models and has fostered rapid growth in the number of operative ACOs. At least an equal number of private ACOs are in operation. Whether or not these organizations will fulfill their promise is unknown but there is reason for cautious optimism. Allergists can and should be part of the process of this transformation in our health care system. They can be integral to helping these organizations save money by reducing hospitalizations and improving the quality of allergy and asthma care in the populations served. In order to accomplish this, allergists must become more involved in their medical communities and hospitals.

Reforming Medicaid for medically complex children.

Children's hospitals play a central role in our child health care system. These hospitals face unique challenges under health care reform. They care for children with the most complex medical problems but often are not reimbursed for good preventive care, care coordination, or quality. We discuss a proposal by children's hospital leaders to create a network of Nationally Designated Children's Hospitals. These would be Centers of Excellence on which states and families could rely to care for a uniquely vulnerable and uniquely costly population of children. On a federal level, the proposal is focused on 3 provisions: (1) creating and delivering a national coordinated delivery model for children with chronic and complex conditions in Medicaid and the State Child Health Insurance Program; (2) developing pediatric-specific care coordination guidelines, quality metrics, and network adequacy standards to improve pediatric care delivery; and (3) producing cost savings by reducing fragmentation in care delivery, while providing a payment model that provides a significant measure of budget certainty for states and the federal government, either through a bundled payment or a shared savings payment method. We believe that this approach will ensure access to appropriate care without compromising the quality of care. It will also provide enhanced budget certainty for Medicaid and the State Child Health Insurance Program.