Author: Meghan Barrett

NABH Launches ‘Safe Connections’ to Promote Awareness About Youth Mental Health

NABH on Thursday launched Safe Connections, a campaign intended to educate policymakers, parents, and the public about the effects of social media on our nation’s youth and to provide tools and resources to help keep kids safe online.
 
The NABH Youth Services Committee, under the direction of Committee Chair Jameson Norton, M.B.A., FACHE, chief operating officer at Newport Healthcare, oversaw the campaign’s vision and purpose, and Donald Grant, Ph.D., with Newport Healthcare, helped developed the campaign’s resources.
 
Please visit our Youth Services landing page to access our first two resources: Youth Social Media Use and Mental Health and Misinformation, Malinformation, Disinformation, and Fake News. The page also includes the American Psychological Association’s recent recommendations about healthy teen video viewing that Don Grant also helped to develop.
 
NABH will promote the campaign’s resources on X and LinkedIn and will update the Youth Services page to include social media messages for you and your teams to share.
 
Please be sure to look for new resources in the future, starting with two fact sheets about cyberaggression that NABH will release in January.

NABH 2025 Board Election Ballots Due Tuesday, Dec. 31!

On Dec. 16, NABH e-mailed system members an attachment with NABH Board of Trustees candidate profiles and a ballot to elect new members to the 2025 Board.
 
If you haven’t yet, please vote for the open NABH Board Chair-Elect position and two available Board seats; sign the ballot; scan it; and send it to nabh@nabh.org or maria@nabh.org no later than Tuesday, Dec. 31, 2024.
 
Please note your ballot is not valid without a signature. New Board members and the Board Chair-elect will take office in January 2025.

Government Shutdown Likely as Lawmakers Fail to Reach Agreement 

The fate of a Continuing Resolution (CR) to fund the government remains uncertain as House and Senate leaders continue to fall short on reaching a spending bill agreement while the deadline looms.
 
The original CR would have funded the government through March 14, 2025 and included a one-year farm bill extension, $100 billion in disaster relief, $30 billion in disaster and economic assistance for farmers, and, most critical for NABH members, the renewal of expiring healthcare programs and a robust package of healthcare policies.
 
Both the House and Senate must pass a bill to fund the federal government past the deadline of 12:01 a.m. on Saturday before it heads to the White House for President Biden’s signature. As of this writing, lawmakers haven’t charted a path forward; however, it appears likely they will vote on a “straight CR,” dropping most, if not all, of the additional funding measures, including healthcare extenders.
 
Lawmakers had agreed to extend through 2026 pandemic-era telehealth rules, a 2.5% payment boost for physicians in Medicare, a one-year delay of cuts to disproportionate-share hospitals, and an extension for five years of the opioid-fighting SUPPORT Act, which expired more than a year ago. Policymakers did not include the Modernizing Opioid Treatment Access Act (MOTAA) in this package.
 
It is unclear what healthcare provisions will be included in another CR, and remaining provisions would have to be addressed in the 119^th Congress.
 
NABH has urged Members of Congress to pass the current CR, fully reauthorize the SUPPORT Act, and extend critical telehealth flexibilities that are set to expire.
 
In other year-end congressional developments, the House Veterans Affairs Subcommittee on Health held a legislative hearing to review numerous bills, most of which dealt with the shortfall in veterans’ access to care and specifically the Veterans’ Affairs Department’s (VA) efforts to limit access to care, including behavioral healthcare through the Community Care Program, established with passage of the Mission Act of 2018.
 
VA Committee Chairman Mike Bost (R-Ill.) spoke in favor of his recently introduced legislation,
H.R. 10267 Complete the Mission Act of 2024, which would safeguard (VA) community-based healthcare access by codifying current access standards and would require VA to publish their wait times for all VA medical centers, setting a baseline expectation for timeliness of care. The bill would also establish a defined access standard for the provision of residential substance use treatment, recognizing that time is of the essence when a veteran in an addiction crisis decides help is needed.
 
NABH president & CEO Shawn Coughlin submitted a statement for the record as part of the committee’s proceedings. “We share our members’ growing concern that Veterans Affairs (VA) gatekeepers have presented barriers to veterans receiving the appropriate level of behavioral healthcare services within the amount of time the Mission Act of 2018 promises them,” Coughlin said. “As we understand, veterans who need residential treatment services have faced wait times for services that far exceed the 28-day limit for specialty care, making them eligible to seek community care services. Even then, however, veterans face wait times for behavioral healthcare services that average about two weeks, according to the Government Accountability Office. America’s veterans did not wait to serve our country. We should not make them wait for the behavioral healthcare services they need.”
 
Chairman Bost intends to reintroduce the Complete the Mission Act in the 119^th Congress, where both the House and Senate VA Committees will renew scrutiny over the VA’s Community Care System.
 
Meanwhile in the Senate, S. 1351, the Stop Institutional Child Abuse Act, led by Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas) passed in both the Senate HELP Committee and in the full Senate by Unanimous Consent on Dec, 11. The House passed the bill by a vote of 373 – 33 and it now heads to the President Biden’s desk.
 
Introduced in April 2023, the legislation is also known as the “The Paris Hilton Bill” because of the activist’s advocacy on the legislation that will purportedly increase transparency in youth residential treatment facilities. The original bill would have established a federal work group on Youth Residential Programs to improve the dissemination and implementation of best practices regarding health and safety, but it was amended to direct the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) to issue a report no later than three years after the bill’s enactment and every two years after for a period of 10 years to support the development and implementation of education and training resources for professional and paraprofessional personnel in the fields of healthcare, law enforcement, judiciary, social work, child protection, education, child care, and other relevant fields.
 
Finally, the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) made it close to the finish line but will not pass before this Congress adjourns after being derailed by big tech companies. KOSA would have required social media companies to remove product features doctors believe harm kids’ health.
 
The Senate passed the bill after several redrafts by sponsors to accommodate First Amendment concerns raised by opponents. In September, the House Energy and Commerce Committee advanced a weak version of the bill; however, it was never scheduled for consideration on the House floor. The U.S. Surgeon General and attorneys general in 35 states, as well as physician groups, including the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Psychological Association, have all called on Congress to pass KOSA. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has promised to address kids’ online safety in the new term.

Call for Behavioral Healthcare Clinicians to Help Develop IPF Patient Assessment Instrument

CMS and its contractor Abt Global are recruiting psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses and other behavioral healthcare clinicians to help develop and test a draft patient assessment tool known as the Inpatient Psychiatric Facility Patient Assessment Instrument (IPF-PAI).
 
CMS’ primary objectives for this significant policymaking process are to improve both quality of care and payment accuracy. Eventually, the agency plans to require that a common PAI be used during admission and discharge of every IPF patient.

NABH has confirmed with CMS that our members will have multiple opportunities to weigh in on this project. We strongly urge your participation in the alpha stage, during which Abt will identify the PAI data elements to field-test – a critical stage that requires real-world input from our field. 

To join the alpha stage of IPF PAI development, please apply here by Dec. 30, 2024.

SAMHSA Releases Toolkit Before First SUD Treatment Month

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) has released a toolkit for the first Substance Use Disorder Treatment Month to be observed in January 2025.
 
Substance Use Disorder Treatment Month raises awareness of the benefits and availability of evidence-based treatments for people with a substance use disorder; addresses barriers to treatment, including stigma; and normalizes seeking help.

The toolkit includes information about weekly themes, social media graphics and messaging, a webinar background, and resources that public health organizations, treatment providers, professional associations, and others can use to spread awareness of Substance Use Treatment Month.

Please Submit Data to NABH’s Denial-of-Care Portal

We urge all NABH members to join those already submitting data to our Denial-of-Care Portal.   
 
We are beginning to use aggregated portal data to illustrate and compare prior authorization practices for commercial, Medicare Advantage, and Medicaid managed care denials.
 
Policymakers have expressed particular interest in our aggregate estimate on days of uncompensated charity care, as well as the length of delayed health plan responses to prior-authorization requests.
 
To support this advocacy push, we strongly encourage all NABH members to submit data to the portal. Please contact Emily Wilkins with questions about the data metrics that we are collecting and/or the data-submission process.

Fact of the Week

At the population level, pregnant and parenting adolescents of all genders are at a greater risk than adults for mental health problems during and after the perinatal period,  according to a recent study in the journal Health Affairs. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that pediatricians screen adolescent mothers and fathers for depression and high stress levels as part of routine well-child care. 

Happy Holidays from NABH!

NABH will not publish CEO Update on the next two Fridays and will resume on Friday, Jan 10. The entire NABH staff wishes you, your families, and your teams a very happy, healthy, and safe holiday season!

For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond.

NABH Welcomes Dan Schwartz as New Director of Quality and Addiction Services

NABH is pleased to welcome Dan Schwartz as the association’s new director of quality and addiction services, effective this past Monday, Dec 9.
 
Dan brings to NABH a range of experiences in federal agencies related to addiction services, including most recently in his role as a senior behavioral health policy analyst in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). 
 
In that role, Dan engaged in federal policymaking efforts by providing subject matter expertise about the delivery, financing, and regulation of behavioral health services, with an emphasis on the substance use disorder care continuum, controlled substances, and various mental health topics.
 
Dan also served as the staff lead for the HHS Workgroup on Implementation Strategies for Contingency Management; co-led a workgroup that supported developing legislative proposals related to behavioral health; and was a lead analyst for developing and implementing the HHS Overdose Prevention Strategy.
 
“We are excited to have Dan join our team,” said NABH President and CEO Shawn Coughlin. “He brings energy, experience, and enthusiasm to a critical role in our association.”
 
Prior to working at ASPE, Dan worked at the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
 
Dan earned a master’s degree in public health from Johns Hopkins University, where he was a Bloomberg Fellow in Addiction & Overdose, and a bachelor’s degree in public health from George Washington University.

ADAW Includes NABH Statement About OTPs in Article Responding to Recent NYT Story

The upcoming edition of the publication Alcohol and Drug Abuse Weekly (ADAW) includes a statement NABH posted to its website last weekend in response to a story in The New York Times (NYT) on Dec. 7 that did not provide a full and fair description of opioid treatment programs (OTPs).
 
“OTP facilities play a vital role in addressing the nation’s opioid and addiction crises, and it is imperative that we continue to support providers who do this important work so people in need can immediately access the personalized care, treatment options, and ongoing support services they need to achieve long-term recovery,” NABH said in its statement, which the association sent to members in an NABH Alert on Monday, Dec. 9.
 
ADAW also included responses and statements from The New York Times, NABH member Acadia Healthcare, and the National Association of Addiction Treatment Providers in its latest issue.

NABH and Other Groups Urge CMS to Strengthen MHPAEA Requirements in Medicaid & CHIP

NABH is one of 67 organizations that sent a recent letter to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) recommending ways the agency can strengthen the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act’s (MHPAEA) Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program’s (CHIP) requirements.
 
The seven-page letter urges CMS to implement a host of measures, such as aligning the Medicaid MHPAEA regulations with those in private insurance and adopting the six-step comparative analysis framework for these templates (codified in the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021); strengthening enforcement provisions of MHPAEA in Medicaid and CHIP; amending the templates to require separate analysis and reporting of mental health and substance use disorder; and requiring the collection and evaluation of relevant outcome data to assess MHPAEA compliance in operation.
 
“We would encourage CMS to, at a minimum, post summary documents of these analyses in plain language so Medicaid enrollees and their authorized representatives can get meaningful information about whether and how their plan is in compliance with MHPAEA,” the letter concluded. “These summaries should be accompanied by additional instructions for consumers on how they can get claims processed or reprocessed when a violation has been identified, and how they can enforce their rights if they believe they have been subject to discrimination.”

Call for Behavioral Healthcare Clinicians to Help Develop IPF Patient Assessment Instrument

CMS and its contractor Abt Global are recruiting psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses and other behavioral healthcare clinicians to help develop and test a draft patient assessment tool known as the Inpatient Psychiatric Facility Patient Assessment Instrument (IPF-PAI).
 
CMS’ primary objectives for this significant policymaking process are to improve both quality of care and payment accuracy. Eventually, the agency plans to require that a common PAI be used during admission and discharge of every IPF patient.

NABH has confirmed with CMS that our members will have multiple opportunities to weigh in on this project. We strongly urge your participation in the alpha stage, during which Abt will identify the PAI data elements to field-test – a critical stage that requires real-world input from our field. 

To join the alpha stage of IPF PAI development, please apply here by Dec. 30, 2024.

NIMH to Host Webinar on Youth Suicidal Behaviors on Monday, Dec. 16

The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) will host an hourlong webinar about youth suicidal behaviors this Monday, Dec. 16 starting at 2 p.m. ET.
 
NIMH Acting Director Shelli Avenevoli, Ph.D., and researcher Arielle H. Sheftall, Ph.D. will examine current trends, risk factors, and protective strategies in youth mental health. The two presenters will also highlight research advancements that can shape future efforts to reduce suicide rates among young people in the United States.
 
Click here to register.

Pew Article Highlights How to Reduce Methadone Access Roadblocks in Pharmacies

The Pew Research Center published an article last week outlining federal and state policy changes that could facilitate access to methadone for opioid use disorder in pharmacies by streamlining legal and regulatory requirements to operate Opioid Treatment Program (OTP) medication units.
 
The recommended policy changes focus on approval processes; methadone ordering and storage; and inventory, recordkeeping, and reporting systems.
 
The article was based on a report by the Legislative Analysis and Public Policy Association that analyzes current state and federal laws and regulations that affect access to methadone in pharmacies, with specific consideration of three models for pharmacy-based methadone access: (1) a medication unit in a pharmacy, (2) a mobile medication unit near a pharmacy, and (3) methadone being prescribed by a clinician and dispensed at a pharmacy.

HHS Publishes Report on Wait Time Standards for Behavioral Health Network Adequacy

HHS released a report last week that examined how regulators implemented behavioral healthcare appointment wait time (WT) standards as part of insurance network oversight.
 
The report identified existing wait time standards used in federal and various state programs, including how they are defined, measured, reported, and enforced. Experts interviewed for the project emphasized the importance of using wait time standards to help ensure network adequacy of behavioral health services and acknowledged that further work is needed to refine and interpret standards and properly factor in telehealth and patient preferences.
 
“Regulators interviewed at times have imposed penalties on health plans found to be non-compliant with WT standards,” the report concluded. “However, they prefer to work with health plans to develop corrective action plans and find other strategies to address access gaps, viewing collaborative approaches as more productive than imposing penalties, which could exacerbate access problems for consumers,” it continued. “Regulators also recognize that provider shortages make it harder for health plans to recruit providers to their networks.”

Call for Presenters: NABH to Kick Off AI Webinar Series in 2025

NABH is seeking presenters who have integrated AI in their business operations to share their experiences in the association’s new webinar series about AI in behavioral healthcare scheduled for Spring 2025.
 
The first webinar will focus on using AI to reduce administrative burden and create efficiencies, and the second webinar will highlight using AI for clinical-decision support.

Please contact NABH Associate Manager for Congressional Affairs Emily Wilkins at Emily@nabh.org by close of business this coming Monday, Dec. 16 if you want to participate.   

ICYMI: NABH’s Webinar on Using Publicly Available Data in Health Plan Negotiations

NABH recently hosted a webinar about using hospital data effectively in your negotiations with health plans.

The webinar featured Erica K. Fox, M.B.A., vice president of business development and managed care contracting at Perimeter Healthcare. Please click here for the webinar’s recording and here for the presentation slides.

Please Submit Data to NABH’s Denial-of-Care Portal

We urge all NABH members to join those already submitting data to our Denial-of-Care Portal.   
 
We are beginning to use aggregated portal data to illustrate and compare prior authorization practices for commercial, Medicare Advantage, and Medicaid managed care denials.
 
Policymakers have expressed particular interest in our aggregate estimate on days of uncompensated charity care, as well as the length of delayed health plan responses to prior-authorization requests.
 
To support this advocacy push, we strongly encourage all NABH members to submit data to the portal. Please contact Emily Wilkins with questions about the data metrics that we are collecting and/or the data-submission process.

Fact of the Week

Deaths involving carfentanil increased sharply to an average of 34.4 a month between July 2023 and June 2024 from an average of 3.3 a month between January 2021 and June 2023, according to a recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond.

NABH Expresses Serious Concerns About MOTAA in Letter to House and Senate Leaders

NABH this week sent a letter to House and Senate leaders that reinforced the association’s concerns that the Modernizing Opioid Treatment Access Act (MOTAA) [S. 644/ H.R. 1359] is a misguided attempt to deregulate opioid treatment programs (OTPs), the effective standard of treatment for opioid use disorders (OUDs).
 
In our letter, NABH highlighted three areas of potential, unintended consequences and harms that may result from legislation proposing such abrupt and expansive regulatory changes: the risk of diversion and increases in overdose deaths, the risk of relying on community pharmacies to fill the gap in patient access to care, and the potential for significant harm to populations that already suffer from health inequities.
 
“In addition to the noted dangers, the wholesale regulatory change that would result from this legislation would be difficult to implement,” the letter said. “Other organizations share this practical concern, including law enforcement leaders who note that the proposed changes in MOTAA would lead to more overdose deaths and diversion of methadone…”
 
NABH suggested a more cautious approach to addressing concerns about access to methadone, such as pausing to study carefully the effects of the significant recent efforts to expand access, with a specific focus on understanding the root causes behind incremental of OUD-related overdoses as well as the disproportionate harm suffered by marginalized populations; and encouraging new models of care whereby OTPs can collaborate with local pharmacies to allow stable patients and patients living in rural settings to pick up their OTP-prescribed methadone outside of OTPs.

SAMHSA Releases OTP Guidelines that Align with Regulations Released This Year

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) on Wednesday released Federal Guidelines for Opioid Treatment Programs to provide recommendations and best practices for OTPs related to the implementation and compliance of regulatory changes in 42 CFR Part 8 that became effective in April and for which OTPs were required to comply starting on Oct. 2, 2024.
 
The revised regulations took steps to increase access to evidence-based medications for opioid use disorder, or MOUD, and promote practitioner discretion; support patient-centered care; reduce barriers to treatment; and remove stigmatizing or outdated language from the 2001 regulations.
 
The newly released guidelines replace guidelines published in 2015.

Call for Behavioral Healthcare Clinicians to Help Develop IPF Patient Assessment Instrument

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and its contractor Abt Global are recruiting psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses and other behavioral healthcare clinicians to help develop and test a draft patient assessment tool known as the Inpatient Psychiatric Facility Patient Assessment Instrument (IPF-PAI).
 
CMS’ primary objectives for this significant policymaking process to improve both quality of care and payment accuracy. Eventually, the agency plans to require that a common PAI be used during admission and discharge of every IPF patient.

NABH has confirmed with CMS that our members will have multiple opportunities to weigh in on this project. We strongly urge your participation in the alpha stage, during which Abt will identify the PAI data elements to field-test – a critical stage that requires real-world input from our field. 

To join the alpha stage of IPF PAI development, please apply here by Dec. 30, 2024.

SAMHSA Issue Brief Offers Information on Co-Occurring Mental Health and Substance Use

SAMHSA has released an issue brief for State Mental Health Authorities (SMHA) about co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders (CODs).
 
The document highlights the commonality of CODs and negative outcomes in the absence of evidence-based integrated care. It also provides an overview of treatment barriers and potential solutions and the effectiveness of integrated care.

Call for Presenters: NABH to Kick Off AI Webinar Series in 2025

NABH is seeking presenters who have integrated AI in their business operations to share their experiences in the association’s new webinar series about AI in behavioral healthcare scheduled for Spring 2025.
 
The first webinar will focus on using AI to reduce administrative burden and create efficiencies, and the second webinar will highlight using AI for clinical-decision support.

Please contact NABH Associate Manager for Congressional Affairs Emily Wilkins at Emily@nabh.org by close of business on Monday, Dec. 16 if you want to participate.

ICYMI: NABH’s Webinar on Using Publicly Available Data in Health Plan Negotiations

NABH recently hosted a webinar about using hospital data effectively in your negotiations with health plans.

The webinar featured Erica K. Fox, M.B.A., vice president of business development and managed care contracting at Perimeter Healthcare. Please click here for the webinar’s recording and here for the presentation slides.

Please Submit Data to NABH’s Denial-of-Care Portal

We urge all NABH members to join those already submitting data to our Denial-of-Care Portal.   
 
We are beginning to use aggregated portal data to illustrate and compare prior authorization practices for commercial, Medicare Advantage, and Medicaid managed care denials.
 
Policymakers have expressed particular interest in our aggregate estimate on days of uncompensated charity care, as well as the length of delayed health plan responses to prior-authorization requests.
 
To support this advocacy push, we strongly encourage all NABH members to submit data to the portal. Please contact Emily Wilkins with questions about the data metrics that we are collecting and/or the data-submission process.

Fact of the Week

A study published in Health Affairs this month found that in 2021, 42.8% of U.S. children ages 5-17 lived with an adult who had at least four adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). The report noted that childhood exposure to adult ACEs was correlated negatively with child mental health, particularly among children living in low-income and publicly insured families.
 
For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond.

DEA Extends Authority for Telehealth Prescribing Without an In-person Visit a Third Time

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and HHS this week again temporarily extended the existing telemedicine flexibilities for the prescribing of controlled medications through Dec. 31, 2025.

This latest extension allows prescribing practitioners to prescribe controlled medications without first conducting an in-person evaluation of the patient. This third extension of this flexibility – which was introduced in January 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic – follows the first extension in May 2023 and the second in August 2023.

Among the agencies’ primary objectives for these extensions is to ensure a smooth transition for patients and practitioners who have relied on telemedicine for controlled-medication prescriptions, as well as to preserve access for those who may need this flexibility before a more permanent policy is established.

NABH and other stakeholders continue to wait for DEA and HHS to finalize two proposed rules issued in March 2023: Telemedicine Prescribing of Controlled Substances When the Practitioner and the Patient Have Not Had a Prior In-Person Medical Evaluation and the Expansion of Induction of Buprenorphine via Telemedicine Encounter.

NABH’s comments on these rules were among the 38,000 comments that stakeholders sent to the federal agencies.  

APA Releases Recommendations for Healthy Teen Video Viewing

The American Psychological Association (APA) this week issued its first set of recommendations to help parents, policymakers, and tech companies empower teens to manage their viewing habits.

The APA Recommendations for Healthy Teen Video Viewing summarizes scientific research on adolescents’ viewing habits to offer guidance to parents, youth, and educators, as well as recommendations to policymakers and technical industry professionals for substantial changes.

“Research consistently shows that video content, and the platforms that host it, have the potential to help or harm teens,” APA CEO Arthur C. Evans Jr., Ph.D., said in an announcement about the recommendations. “It is the shared responsibility of video platforms, content creators, parents, caregivers, educators, policymakers and the technology industry to create an environment where youth can learn and express themselves safely online.”

The report calls for tech companies to change the built-in features of their platforms that can affect adolescent well-being because the APA notes platforms that recommend content to youth and switch rapidly between short-form videos and autoplay videos to extend viewing times could magnify the effects of harmful video content and contribute to maladaptive viewing habits in youth.

In addition, the report recommends limiting exposure to content that encourages violent or risky behaviors and/or reinforces negative stereotypes, especially on platforms that allow users to share content or add comments or “likes” that may endorse harmful behaviors; guiding adolescents to choose content based on quality and accuracy, especially when evaluating health related information by creators who are not licensed health professionals; teaching adolescents about false, damaging or biased information and other risks introduced by content generated by artificial intelligence (AI); encouraging access to video content that promotes empathy, learning, emotional well-being and joy; and encouraging video skills that allow adolescents to develop healthy relationship skills.

Your Expertise is Needed to Help Develop IPF Patient Assessment Instrument

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is recruiting participants to help the agency, its contractors RTI International and Abt Global, and other partners develop and test a draft patient assessment instrument, or the Inpatient Psychiatric Facility Patient Assessment Instrument (IPF-PAI).

NABH urges all members to assist CMS and participate in this important project that aims to advance care quality in IPFs. Your feedback will help inform CMS’ efforts in the agency’s rulemaking process.

Please click here to learn more and here to apply.

Call for Presenters: NABH to Kick Off AI Webinar Series in 2025

NABH is seeking presenters who have integrated AI in their business operations to share their experiences in the association’s new webinar series about AI in behavioral healthcare scheduled for Spring 2025.

The first webinar will focus on using AI to reduce administrative burden and create efficiencies, and the second webinar will highlight using AI for clinical-decision support.

Please contact NABH Associate Manager for Congressional Affairs Emily Wilkins at Emily@nabh.org by close of business on Monday, Dec. 16 if you are interested in participating.

ICYMI: NABH’s Webinar on Using Publicly Available Data in Health Plan Negotiations

NABH on Nov. 14 hosted a webinar about using hospital data effectively in your negotiations with health plans.

The webinar featured Erica K. Fox, M.B.A., vice president of business development and managed care contracting at Perimeter Healthcare. Please click here for the webinar’s recording and here for the presentation slides.

Please Visit Our New Website!

NABH’s website is live!  NABH has designed our updated site to help members, policymakers, journalists, patient advocates, and the general public learn about our association and the resources we provide in a way that is easier to navigate so you find what you’re looking for quickly and efficiently.

We have also updated our member password, which is required for member-only resources, such as our letters to congressional offices and regulatory agencies, as well as previous editions of CEO Update (all of which can be found by clicking on the “News” tab. NABH members should refer to the NABH Alert they received on Thursday, Oct. 31 for the new member password.

Please e-mail nabh@nabh.org with any questions or feedback you may have about the new site.

Please Submit Data to NABH’s Denial-of-Care Portal

We urge all NABH members to join those already submitting data to our Denial-of-Care Portal.   

We are beginning to use aggregated portal data to illustrate and compare prior authorization practices for commercial, Medicare Advantage, and Medicaid managed care denials.

Policymakers have expressed particular interest in our aggregate estimate on days of uncompensated charity care, as well as the length of delayed health plan responses to prior-authorization requests.

To support this advocacy push, we strongly encourage all NABH members to submit data to the portal. Please contact Emily Wilkins with questions about the data metrics that we are collecting and/or the data-submission process.

Fact of the Week

The University of South Florida will track young people through 2050 to learn more about the long-term effects of smartphones, social media, and other digital media on individual wellbeing.

Happy Thanksgiving!

The NABH staff wishes its members and their families a very happy, healthy, and safe Thanksgiving! NABH will not publish CEO Update next week and will resume on Friday, Dec. 6, 2024.
 
For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond.

SAMHSA Announces Behavioral Health Workforce Career Navigator

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration this week launched the
Behavioral Health Workforce Career Navigator to help current and aspiring behavioral health professionals identify state requirements for a range of behavioral health careers.
 
“We need a behavioral health workforce that can meet our country’s needs. That includes helping current and aspiring behavioral health workers pursue their careers and thrive in their work,” HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said in an announcement. “The new Behavioral Health Workforce Career Navigator is an important tool towards improving the process of finding and comparing education, training, and licensure and certification requirements across the country. President Biden and Vice President Harris’ Unity Agenda continues to take on the biggest challenges facing Americans, including addressing our nation’s behavioral health needs.”
 
HHS will host a webinar about the new resource today, Friday, Nov. 15 at 3 p.m. ET. Click here to register.
 
If you haven’t yet, please be sure to check out the NABH Education and Research Foundation’s Workforce Startup Guide and share it with members of your human resources and operations teams.

Trump Chooses RFK, Jr. to Lead HHS While Senate GOP Leadership Takes Shape

President-elect Donald Trump on Thursday named environmental lawyer and activist Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., son of the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, as the nation’s next HHS secretary.
 
Kennedy, a widely known vaccine skeptic, will require Senate confirmation to lead the department that oversees agencies including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the Food and Drug Administration, and the National Institutes of Health.
 
“The safety and health of all Americans is the most important role of any administration, and HHS will play a big role in helping ensure that everybody will be protected from harmful chemicals, pollutants, pesticides, pharmaceutical products, and food additives that have contributed to the overwhelming health crisis in this country,” Trump wrote Thursday in a post on the social media platform X.
 
Meanwhile, in the Senate, Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) was elected by his peers to serve as majority leader to lead the Republican Caucus and control the Senate’s legislative agenda. Thune succeeds Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) after McConnell decided to step down from the position while remaining in the Senate until the end of his term. Thune was elected to the Senate in 2005, ousting then-Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.). A leader in the Senate Finance Committee, Thune has been a strong proponent for repealing the IMD exclusion.
 
Sen. Bill Cassidy, M.D. (R-La.) and Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) are positioned to chair the Senate HELP and Finance Committees, respectively, following the Republican victory on Nov. 5 that flipped Senate control to the GOP from Democrats. Cassidy is a policy-focused gastroenterologist. As ranking member of the Senate HELP Committee, Cassidy focused on pharmacy benefit manager reform and on site-neutral payment policy, among other issues. He has been a proponent of increasing access to behavioral healthcare services and voted in favor of S. 644, the Modernizing Opioid Treatment Access Act (MOTAA) in committee last December. Cassidy has heard the concerns over MOTAA from NABH and NABH member companies and allied groups and has appeared interested in working towards a mutually agreeable outcome. It is unknown currently to what extent he will prioritize the issue.
 
Both chairmen are expected to advocate for limited government and market-driven strategies to cut healthcare costs and work closely with President-elect Trump to implement his administration’s priorities, which could include allowing enhanced Affordable Care Act (ACA) subsidies to expire and promoting policies that chip away at the ACA and Medicaid. The chairmen will also have to advance a slew of Trump administration health nominees.
 
With the GOP gaining control of both chambers of Congress, lawmakers may use Reconciliation – a complex process allowing bill passage with a simple majority vote — to push through priority legislation.
 
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is likely to remain as the HELP Committee’s ranking member. The incoming majority party will have two seats to fill, while the incoming minority party will have one vacancy.
 
With Crapo’s ascension, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) will become the Senate Finance Committee’s ranking member. Democrats will have six seats to fill due to the retirement of Sens. Stabenow (D-Mich.), Carper (D-Del.), and Cardin (D-Md.) and the defeats of Sens. Brown (D-Ohio), and Casey (D-Pa.) and resignation of Menendez (D-N.J.)
 
The House of Representatives will choose its committee chairmen and ranking members in December.

Future of the Kids Online Safety Act is Uncertain as 118^th Congress Wraps Up

The outlook for the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) is uncertain despite the Senate approving the legislation in a 91-3 vote this past July.
 
Introduced shortly after Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, M.D. released his advisory on social media and youth mental health, the bill aims to protect children from the harm social media causes to youth mental, physical, and emotional health by requiring social media companies to protect children’s privacy, prevent targeted advertising, and block manipulative algorithms to users 17 and younger.
 
The House Energy and Commerce Committee approved the bill on Sept. 18 and the measure is seen as a priority for outgoing House Energy and Commerce Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.); however, leaders including House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) find the “platform duty-of-care” requirements and potential for censorship problematic. 

Amended to mitigate the concerns about the duty-of-care language and the provision that would require tech companies to remove features that encourage compulsive use, the bill advanced through the committee process and has just a few weeks to become law before the 118^th Congress ends.

Some youth and parent advocacy groups are concerned that the House version lacks the strength of the Senate version. Referring to the House version of the bill, Zamaan Qureshi, co-chair of the youth-led coalition Design It For Us, said “…In essence (it) removed the ability to target some of the design features that have preyed on my generation, preyed on young people,” according to Roll Call. Some parent advocacy groups said they hope Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and other Senate leaders will encourage House counterparts to pass the legislation.

If the bill does not pass during this Congress, it will need to be introduced in the 119^th Congress.

Please Visit Our New Website!

NABH’s website is live!  NABH has designed our updated site to help members, policymakers, journalists, patient advocates, and the general public learn about our association and the resources we provide in a way that is easier to navigate so you find what you’re looking for quickly and efficiently.
 
We have also updated our member password, which is required for member-only resources, such as our letters to congressional offices and regulatory agencies, as well as previous editions of CEO Update (all of which can be found by clicking on the “News” tab. NABH members should refer to the NABH Alert they received on Thursday, Oct. 31 for the new member password.

Please e-mail nabh@nabh.org with any questions or feedback you may have about the new site. 

ICYMI: NABH’s Webinar on Using Publicly Available Data in Health Plan Negotiations

NABH on Thursday hosted a webinar about using hospital data effectively in your negotiations with health plans.

The webinar featured Erica K. Fox, M.B.A., vice president of business development and managed care contracting at Perimeter Healthcare.

Please click here for the webinar’s recording and here for the presentation slides.

Reminder: Manatt to Host Webinar About State Medicaid Innovations to Address America’s Behavioral Health Crisis

Research firm Manatt will host a webinar with state leaders to address topics such as 1115 demonstrations, strategies to combine Medicaid with other sources of funding, and what policies states are implementing to address the nation’s behavioral health crisis.
 
The hourlong webinar will start at 3 p.m. ET on Thursday, Nov. 21. Click here to register.

Please Submit Data to NABH’s Denial-of-Care Portal

We urge all NABH members to join those already submitting data to our Denial-of-Care Portal.   
 
We are beginning to use aggregated portal data to illustrate and compare prior authorization practices for commercial, Medicare Advantage, and Medicaid managed care denials.
 
Policymakers have expressed particular interest in our aggregate estimate on days of uncompensated charity care, as well as the length of delayed health plan responses to prior-authorization requests.
 
To support this advocacy push, we strongly encourage all NABH members to submit data to the portal. Please contact NABH Associate Manager for Congressional Affair Emily Wilkins with questions about the data metrics that we are collecting and/or the data-submission process.

Fact of the Week

Rates of hospitalizations and ED visits related to mental health exceeded expected rates in only the second year after the pandemic onset (6% and 5%, respectively), whereas those related to self-harm persistently increased above expected rates after the pandemic onset (28% and 43% in the third year, respectively), according to a recent study in JAMA Network Open.  

For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond