Courtesy of Healing Minds NOLA September 16th, 2020.
Hello all, on Friday, September 18th, 2020 I watched a presentation by Healing Minds NOLA on the IMD exclusion with Tim Murphy and Teresa Pasquini, moderated by Janey Hays and Eric Smith. This segment focused on the IMD exclusion; a part of the original 1965 Medicaid law. I encourage each of you to watch this presentation.
The Institutions for Mental Disease (IMD) exclusion is an outdated, discriminatory federal rule that creates significant barriers to treatment for adults with severe mental illness. Under this rule, Medicaid restricts payments to states for non-geriatric adults (the exclusion applies to individuals aged 21 through 64) from receiving psychiatric care in a treatment facility with more than 16 beds. This limits the ability of states to provide an adequate number of treatment beds for psychiatric illnesses, especially those individuals with severe mental illness.
Tim Murphy, Ph.D. a psychologist, and former Pennsylvania State Senator and U. S. Congressman, was the primary author of “HELPING FAMILIES IN MENTAL HEALTH CRISIS ACT 2015 HR 2646” (“HFMHCA”). The HFMHCA requires the Assistant Secretary of Mental Health to focus on improving the most important metrics associated with mental illness and particularly severe mental illness, including rates of suicide and attempts, emergency psychiatric hospitalizations, emergency room boarding, arrests, incarcerations, victimization, and homelessness. The bill dramatically adjusts the threshold to be used in determining the efficacy of programs. It establishes a coordinating committee to advise the Secretary that includes significant representation from criminal justice, a needed addition of an important stakeholder to the national conversation.
Read more at: https://mentalillnesspolicy.org/federalmentalillnesslegislation/hr2646/hr2646narrative.html
Representative Tim Murphy worked with many families on the HFMHCA legislation. Unfortunately, the final version of the legislation HFMHCA included measures to repeal the IMD exclusion, but these provisions never made it into the final law. Also left on the cutting room floor was a more precise and transparent definition of “grave disability”. These are important items for consideration going forward.
This webinar is about the IMD exclusion, but it goes much further explaining the history of mental illness, severe mental illness, and many of our behavioral health system’s shortcomings. This video is a straightforward exposition of how our behavioral health system fails people with serious mental illness. I urge everybody to watch it. In addition, Representative Tim Murphy makes a very impassioned plea for advocacy.
For this and several more informative webinars, I urge you to visit Janet Hays, Director (Healing Minds NOLA) & Eric Smith (Mental Health Advocate and Graduate Student). They are co-hosting an 8-part series on Implementing a Full Continuum of Coordinated Psychiatric Treatment and Care.
Learn about the IMD exclusion; which is Medicaid Institutions for Mental Disease (IMD) exclusion is an outdated, discriminatory federal rule that creates significant barriers to treatment for adults with severe mental illness. Under this rule, Medicaid payments to states are prohibited for non-geriatric adults receiving psychiatric care in a treatment facility with more than 16 beds.
By Dr. Charles Goldstein
What Is the IMD Exclusion?
The IMD exclusion is a long-standing policy under Medicaid that prohibits the federal government from providing federal Medicaid funds to states for services rendered to certain Medicaid-eligible individuals who are patients in IMDs (§1905(a)(30)(B) of the Social Security Act [SSA]). When a Medicaid-eligible individual is a patient in an IMD, he or she cannot receive Medicaid coverage for services provided inside or outside the IMD. Due to the exceptions explained in the “Legislative History” section, the IMD exclusion applies to individuals aged 21 through 64. Determination of whether a facility is an IMD depends on whether its overall character is that of a facility established and maintained primarily to care for and treat individuals with mental diseases. Examples include a facility that is licensed or accredited as a psychiatric facility or one in which mental disease is the current reason for institutionalization for more than 50% of the patients. For the definition of IMDs, the term mental disease includes diseases listed as mental disorders in the International Classification of Diseases, with a few exceptions (e.g., mental retardation). (See Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services [CMS], State Medicaid Manual, Part 4, §4390.) Under this definition, substance use disorders (SUDs) are included as mental diseases. If the substance abuse treatment follows a psychiatric model and is performed by medical personnel, it is considered the medical treatment of mental disease.
However, even with the IMD exclusion, states can receive federal Medicaid funding for inpatient mental health services for individuals aged 21 through 64 outside of an IMD. States can provide Medicaid coverage for services rendered in facilities that do not meet the definition of an IMD, such as facilities with 16 or fewer beds and facilities that are not primarily engaged in providing care to individuals with mental diseases. https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/IF10222.pdf
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