Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration

CMHS Consumer Affairs E-News
March 25, 2005, Vol. 05-45

CMS POSTED TWO NEW PAPERS DISCUSSING MEDICAID-SUPPORTED MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES

The Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS) has worked with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to develop technical assistance papers on topics that State officials and others have identified as having particular importance for Medicaid-supported mental health services. These papers are intended to clarify specific mental health-related Medicaid policies or to highlight promising State practices for consideration by other States.

CMS has posted two additional papers on their website: one entitled "Best Practices in State Medicaid and Mental Health Program Collaboration" which identifies and describes the basic elements of successful collaboration and, one entitled "Utilizing the Section 1115 Health Insurance Flexibility and Accountability Act (HIFA) Waiver Option to Improve Services for Persons with Mental Illness" which describes how a State may use the HIFA waiver option under Section 1115 authority to improve access to community-based services for persons with mental illness. These papers may be accessed under "Mental Health under the President's New Freedom Initiative" either through the New Freedom Initiative web page at http://www.cms.hhs.gov/newfreedom/ or through the Promising Practices web page at http://www.cms.hhs.gov/promisingpractices/default.asp.

These papers continue the series that CMS anticipates issuing to States. The first paper was issued on August 20, 2004 on the topic "Psychotropic Medications: Addressing Costs without Restricting Access"
and it described innovative State efforts to address medication cost and quality of care issues without restricting access to specific medications. These papers represent continuing efforts by CMS to work with other federal agencies to further the President's goal of maximizing opportunities for persons with disabilities and reducing the use of institutional settings.

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The Center for Mental Health Services is a component of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, United States Department of Health and Human Services.