Advocates for a state program that helps Medicaid patients avoid hospital stays are hoping next year\u2019s budget provides a boost.<\/p>\n
The New York Health Home Coalition is seeking a 15% increase in reimbursement rates \u2014 which would cost about $29 million \u2014 along with pay raises for care management workers.<\/p>\n
The Health Homes program serves more than 188,000 adults and children in New York who are on Medicaid and who have complex health and mental health needs.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur rates have been stagnant since 2018,\u201d said Laurie Lanphear, executive director of the coalition, adding that cumulative inflation topped 30% in that time. \u201cSo, our care management agencies are really struggling to maintain this service.\u201d<\/p>\n
Most Health Homes care employees were also not included in this year\u2019s inflationary wage increase for human services, according to Lanphear.<\/p>\n
Agencies and advocates rallied at the Capitol earlier this month to take their message to Gov. Kathy Hochul. Paul Hunter, a senior care manager at The Dennelisse Corp., traveled from The Bronx to take part.<\/p>\n
\u201cI’ve been working for the Health Home for like over like 16 years, and \u2026 we do tremendous work,\u201d Hunter said. \u201cI think we make a huge difference in serving those with mental illness and substance use.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lanphear cited research that shows the program leads to fewer emergency room and other hospital visits.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat alone is saving a significant amount for these very high utilizers of care to keep them stabilized in their communities,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The work on crafting next year\u2019s budget is already underway with the governor\u2019s budget proposal set to be released early next year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Advocates for a state program that helps Medicaid patients avoid hospital stays are hoping next year\u2019s budget provides…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":373455,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,9,24,63,129,131,130],"class_list":["post-373454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/373454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=373454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/373454\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/373455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=373454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=373454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=373454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}