Quarles & Brady LLP’s Post

Without stable housing, recovery for substance use disorder is nearly impossible. Read our latest Nothing but Substance blog post as we discuss the three organizations (NARR, SAMHSA, and ASAM) who are pushing for policies in hope that these homes are one day covered by insurers. #healthlaw #behavioralhealth #addictiontreatment

Without stable housing, recovery for substance use disorder is nearly impossible. Read our latest Nothing but Substance blog post as we discuss the three organizations (NARR, SAMHSA, and ASAM) who are pushing for policies in hope that these homes are one day covered by insurers. #healthlaw #behavioralhealth #addictiontreatment

Support for post-incarceration transitions is crucial. Those re-entering society face health risks, making consistent access to substance use disorder treatment vital to reduce reincarceration, relapse, and overdose risks. https://lnkd.in/g6C57Uyw

Deinstitutionalization, although well intended in many respects, has turned out to be a immense failure for the severally mentally ill and people with addiction issues. Medicaid paying for residential substance use disorder treatment, even for a short period, would be a significant improvement. This idea that it must be community based resources OR residential treatment needs to end. It’s both. Both are needed. “Nearly 60 years after Congress barred Medicaid from treating people in what were then derided as insane asylums, lawmakers are on the verge of reversing course.” “They say the 1965 rule barring Medicaid, the federal-state health care program for the poor and lower-middle income, from funding hospital treatment has had unintended consequences: a lack of psychiatric beds for people who need them. Instead, they said, many vulnerable people end up on the streets, in emergency rooms, in jails or dead.” #substanceusedisorder #substanceabuse #addictionrecovery #addictiontreatment #recoveryispossible #mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness #mentalhealthmatters #mentalhealthprofessionals #mentalillness

Access to coverage and care is essential for people with mental illness to successfully manage their condition and get on a path of recovery. #Medicaid is a lifeline for much of that care as the nation’s largest payer of mental health and substance use condition services – providing health coverage to more than one in four adults with serious mental illness. Closing the coverage gap can significantly strengthen behavioral health treatment and services in Georgia. About 25 percent of uninsured Georgians who would qualify for Medicaid expansion coverage suffer from mental illness or substance abuse. By closing the coverage gap, Medicaid removes barriers for people with mental illness by allowing them to qualify based on income rather than a disability determination. This helps people get the mental health services they need, when they need them. Be an advocate for closing the coverage gap. Please click on the link below and use our message (and add your own, if you wish) to send to the Georgia House Health Committee. As always, thank you for your advocacy and support! https://lnkd.in/eA85eeEm NAMI Georgia NAMI #CloseTheGap #Together4MH #ReimagineCrisis #morethanenough #Act4MentalHealth #GAParity #MentalIllness #MentalHealthSupport #MentalHealthAdvocates #MentalHealthMatters #MentalHealthCare #GARecovers

It’s not just Congress wanting to treat people who live with the most serious mental illnesses and substance use disorders. It’s #FamiliesLikeOurs. The pendulum swung too far with the passing of the Community Mental Health Act of 1963, the Medicaid Act of 1965 with the IMD Exclusion, and then eventually with allowing insurance companies to have more power than treating providers in deciding the appropriate levels of care. No one wants to return to the atrocities that occurred in the past in very large state run psychiatric hospitals. No one. But, we do need to understand that some people with the most severe illnesses need hospital and long term care, and that providing this is far more humane than abandoning them to the revolving doors of homelessness, emergency rooms, far too short hospitalizations, incarcerations and death. We can provide a full continuum of care and improve the level of care in all settings - both in the community and in hospitals. We just need to decide to do it well, and fund it fully. #RipplesOfHope #EndIMDExclusion #ProvidingMedicallyNecessaryTreatmentIsHumane

Had a client referral phone call today for myhealingcircles.org. An older woman who had lost her husband last year and was concerned about her growing financial concerns as she was also facing increasing health concerns. I told her I would send her some resources that she could access immediately and transferred her to the provider she was calling for. But what stuck out to me- as a widow myself - was her situation felt dire. Is she one of The silent poor in America? Often the widows life looks fine to those on the outside - but if you were look in her frig and all you see is an apple and a jug of milk... it might shock you ( it would shock me) She said "I only have .20 cents" . "As women age, they become more vulnerable to poverty. The poverty rate for women age 65 and older is roughly 12%, just over 1 in 10 live in poverty. But for widowed women age 65 and older, the poverty rate is much higher with approximately 51% living on less than $22,000 a year." wiserwomen.org If you are a behavioral health therapist or a group provider and might be looking for an affiliate relationship in senior care. Go to myhealingcircles.org and send an inquiry.  The need is huge. #seniorcare #behavioralhealth #homehealthandhospice #providers #caregivers

Suicide in older adults is a result of depression due to bereavement, decline of physical health and loss of independence. While more research, possible prevention interventions must include Public-health campaigns to help people recognize risk factors or symptoms and Better detection and treatment of people at risk of suicide in late life, most importantly training for primary-health providers who are likely to come into contact with elderly at-risk individuals.

In the two years prior to Measure 110, the Council of State Governments Justice Center reviewed jail data and found high rates of untreated behavior health disorders. The conclusion of that research: we needed to stop using our jails to sequester sick people and start fixing our health care system. Measure 110 was a next step down that path by pairing traditional inpatient and outpatient techniques with social supports that make the treatment stick. https://lnkd.in/gN59myzA #healthcare #recoveryispossible

Could the Federal Government and both parties be closer to repealing the discriminatory Institutions for Mental Diseases (IMD) exclusion which denies urgent medically necessary treatment to people living with treatable neurological brain diseases like #schizophrenia, #bipolardisorder, and/or #substanceabusedisorders? This ill conceived legislation meant to empty out the old asylums and transition very sick people into what turned out to be the empty promise of community care has been a disaster leading to untold deaths and suffering. Why are these treatable diseases still, after 60+ years, being left out in the cold from federal funding? No other diseases are fiscally discriminated against in this way. It's way past time to #EndIMDExclusion. "Nearly 60 years after Congress barred Medicaid from treating people in what were then derided as insane asylums, lawmakers are on the verge of reversing course." "They say the 1965 rule barring Medicaid, the federal-state health care program for the poor and lower-middle income, from funding hospital treatment has had unintended consequences: a lack of psychiatric beds for people who need them. Instead, they said, many vulnerable people end up on the streets, in emergency rooms, in jails or dead." "They say the policy also perpetuates discrimination against people who suffer from drug addiction and mental illness compared to those with physical conditions, for which there’s no such exclusion." #brainhealth #substanceabuse #recovery #housingthatheals #earlypsychosisprograms #psychosis #endneglect #enddiscrimination