There was another full agenda for the Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS) Expert Panel meeting held on December 10, 2010.  As background, in 2008, the HCBS Expert Panel was convened to assist the Department of Human Services (DHS) in developing a Profile of Minnesota’s home and community-based services system, and to discuss strategies for improving Minnesota’s HCBS.  Since that time, the HCBS Expert Panel has completed their work on the State LTC Profile, provided input into the selection of provider performance measures, and supported a variety of interwoven subgroups.  While much of the Expert Panel meetings consists of updates from state agency staff, there are also opportunities for input, and suggestions on direction setting.  The Association is represented on the HCBS Expert Panel by Association President/CEO Patti Cullen.  Note, many of the past materials can be found on the Expert Panel’s website.  Following are a few highlights from the most recent meeting.

• Staff and consultants provided an update on the “Long-Term Care and Support Dashboard.”  The state received grant money through the end of this year from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to not only complete the LTC Profile but also to develop state-specific measures for a dashboard.  The dashboard measures are intended to illustrate areas of overall system performance important to the long-term care and supports policy community.  Measures are presented according to Quality Focus Areas identified in the Home and Community-Based Services Quality Framework developed by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), which the Continuing Care Administration uses in other quality management activities.  Because the grant money is finished in a few weeks, and because some of the proposed measures rely on data that is not yet being collected, it will be some time before we will be seeing this dashboard in its final form.

• Staff released a large, multi-colored chart that visually depicts the intersection of three of the major reform initiatives being worked on by the Continuing Care Administration and stakeholders:  MN Choices (formerly known as COMPASS) finalization and Personal Care Attendant Program changes; standardized provider enrollment process and policy (known as PEPSI); and standardized ratesetting project (known as RSMI).  While each of these initiatives has been independently progressing, the goal of DHS staff is to better show the integration and sequencing of these major initiatives.

• Another area of interest of the Expert Panel is state involvement in any of the initiatives newly available for states under the federal health care reform act.  Agency staff have been working internally on the application for the Money Follows the Person demonstration—Expert Panel members have requested to see a draft of the application before it is submitted to CMS.  The grant is due for submission by January 7, 2011, with funding starting in April 2011 if the state’s request is approved.

• The Expert Panel received a presentation on the work to date on a report due to the Legislature on December 15 relating to Housing Options.  The original language for the Housing Options study focused on housing options for persons with disabilities—options such as land trusts or cooperative models that would allow persons with disabilities to control their housing choices.  Over time other legislative mandates were woven into this study request, including the controversial size/setting/concentration proposal.  We were assured that there is no rush to meet the December 15th deadline date—there is still work to be done on the report, especially in the size/setting proposal.  The Panel requested to see a draft of the report before it is distributed to the Legislature.

Patti Cullen, CAE
952.851.2487
pcullen@careproviders.org

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