Parity reform may heighten clinical and administrative requirements for outpatient mental health providers. These laws may make in-network agreements simpler and more profitable, as many providers hope. Yet talk of parity is often one-sided, focused on perceived payer wrongs. This overshadows the role of clinicians and their organizations in increasing access to and improving care […]
Category: Regulation
There’s a big problem with measurement-based care in behavioral health that few are talking about: the fact that many clinicians are highly skeptical of payers. While most therapists use clinical assessments to care for patients, many are concerned about privacy and how health plans will use the data that’s shared with them. These attitudes come […]
Key Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) leaders said little last week during the roughly 11 hours of live presentations heard over two days of listening sessions regarding the future of telehealth and prescribing controlled substances. What they did say, however, helps clarify what is top of mind for the DEA as the agency considers re-approaching how […]
November is fast approaching, and with it comes the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) proposed rule on telehealth and controlled substance prescribing. After a six-month delay, the federal law enforcement and regulatory body will release regulations that will shape the future of telehealth within behavioral health in the post-COVID era. It also has the potential to […]
Behavioral health integration will play a major role in The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) latest cost control initiative. On Tuesday, CMS unveiled the States Advancing All-Payer Health Equity Approaches and Development Model (AHEAD Model). It is an 11-year total cost-of-care reduction model meant to give state governments the tools to reduce spending […]
The federal government gave the behavioral health industry a behind-the-scenes look at its strategic priorities for the coming years earlier this month. Those priorities, outlined by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), include a push to better integrate behavioral health care into physical health care — and the other way around. Other […]
The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has openly signaled a reversal in its stance towards a long-mandated special registration process that would allow telehealth prescribing of certain controlled substances. In a newly published meeting notice, the DEA says the voluminous and negative feedback on its proposed rule for post-public health emergency telehealth regulations inspired its new […]
Lawmakers have introduced a new bill that, if passed, would extend funding for electronic health records (EHRs) and other technologies to behavioral health providers. Behavioral health providers have been slower to adopt EHRs and other technologies than physical health providers. A big reason for that is behavioral health providers were left out of the 2009 […]
Behavioral health providers don’t have to accept the status quo when it comes to challenging state markets. Savvy operators can change fundamental aspects of the markets in which they operate through lobbying and advocacy. This is a right — and even civic obligation — for members of the public to push officials to make changes. […]
The public comment period hasn’t begun for the Biden administration’s recently published proposed mental health parity rule. But that hasn’t stopped a flood of commentary on the rule from entering the public sphere already. On July 25, the administration released a proposed rule that firms up mental health parity in terms of health plan’s compliance […]