Overview

Welcome to our online toolkit for partners in service to Connecticut residents eligible for the HUSKY Health program. We hope you find this content informative and useful in helping clients access and maintain eligibility. Please take a few moments to scroll through the toolkit. You can also reach this section at any time at www.ct.gov/dss/partners.

Financial Trends in the Connecticut HUSKY Health Program - A Foundation for Sustainability; presentation to the Medical Assistance Program Oversight Committee (February 8, 2019; revised February 15, 2019).  Please note: the revised presentation reflects updated enrollment counts for 2012-2015 across all DSS programs, to correct an earlier data integration process error.  As a result, the count of the number of people served increased by 13% for 2012, 10% for 2013, 8% for 2014 and 4% for 2015 (counts for 2016, 2017 and 2018 remain unchanged).  These updated enrollment numbers cause updated per-member/per-month cost data, incorporated in the revised version. Bottom line, however: the downward cost trends remain in effect.  We regret any inconvenience that may have been caused by the initial version of our presentation. 

 

HUSKY Health Dental Program Update; presentation to the Medical Assistance Program Oversight Committee (February 8, 2019)

 

Key Facts About Connecticut Medicaid (September 15, 2018)

10 Things to Know About Connecticut Medicaid (November 8, 2018)

 

Overview of HUSKY Health/Medicaid/CHIP –Consolidated Issue Briefs (September 15, 2018)

Updated [November 9, 2018] A Guide to Connecticut’s Person-Centered Medical Homes-Plus (PCMH+) Initiative

PCMH+ provides person-centered, comprehensive and coordinated care to HUSKY Health members. PCMH+ builds on the success of Connecticut Medicaid's Person-Centered Medical Home (PCMH) program, and works to improve HUSKY members’ overall health, assists with access to services like healthy food, transportation to medical appointments, and assistance in finding community agencies that support housing or employment.

PCMH+ Status Update, November 2018 Medical Assistance Program Oversight Council Meeting.  Please follow this link to view:  PCMH+ Status Update   (November 8, 2018)

 

DSS Health Services Director Kate McEvoy presented to the State Innovation Model (SIM) Steering Committee a look at PCMH+ Wave 1 program performance.  Please follow this link to view:  SIM Steering Committee presentation (May 2018).

PCMH+ Wave 2 launched on April 1, 2018, for Wave 1 providers, and started on May 1 for brand-new providers.  To learn more about PCMH+  and Wave 2, please visit PCMH+ webpage (also at www.ct.gov/dss/pcmhplus).  HUSKY Members can also  visit the PCMH+ Member Information webpage.

 

Electronic Visit Verification

The Department of Social Services is partnering with Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Sandata Technologies, LLC. in the implementation of Electronic Visit Verification (EVV). 

EVV is a telephonic and computer-based in-home scheduling, tracking and billing system. Specifically, EVV documents the precise time and type of care provided by care-givers right at the point of care. 

Please follow this link for more information about this innovative new system.

 

SPECIAL TOPIC! How Connecticut is Linking Housing and Health Care Needs to Improve Outcomes, Control Costs

Connecticut is one of eight states on the leading edge of coordinating systems to ensure that people experiencing chronic homelessness and who have intensive health care needs and/or disabling conditions have access to a robust service package linked to housing opportunities and improved health outcomes.  We have been selected to participate in the Innovator Accelerator Program on State Medicaid-Housing Agency Partnerships, sponsored by the federal Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services (part of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services).  The overall goal is to break the cycle of homelessness and accompanying poor health by promoting a stabilizing quality of life and health care access that, in turn, reduces taxpayer cost in the Medicaid program.

• Please follow this link to learn more about the Innovator Accelerator Program
• Please follow this link to access a comprehensive article in the CT Mirror by Arielle Levin Becker , titled, ‘Can an apartment cut health care costs of homeless ‘super users?’ (May 18, 2016).

EXTRA!  ‘Connecticut Bucks the Trend on Managing Medicaid’ (Wall Street Journal)

A Wall Street Journal article by health and science reporter Melinda Beck adds national perspective to Connecticut’s progress in Medicaid reform.  The HUSKY Health program has improved health outcomes and care experience for members, increased the number of participating providers, reduced administrative costs, streamlined access, and reduced per-member/per-month cost -- all after moving away from for-profit managed care insurers and using Intensive Care Management and Person-Centered Medical Homes, among other reform strategies.

• Please follow this link for the Wall Street Journal hardcopy article from the March 19 - 20, 2016, weekend edition, headlined, ‘Connecticut Bucks the Trend on Managing Medicaid.’
• Please follow this link for a longer version that appeared online, headlined, ‘Connecticut Moves Away from Private Insurers to Administer Medicaid Program.’

Related: 'Spending & Enrollment Up, but Medicaid Per-Person Cost is Down' (CT Mirror)

A Connecticut Mirror article by health reporter Arielle Levin Becker takes an in-depth look at cost and enrollment trends in the HUSKY Health program, interviewing DSS health services and fiscal managers and including a series of graphic presentations.  Please follow this link for the Connecticut Mirror article from January 15, 2016.

For full immersion in Connecticut’s Medicaid reform agenda, please check out this package of materials from an Informational Forum on Connecticut’s Medicaid Expenditures, Initiatives and Long-Term Services & Supports Rebalancing, General Assembly’s Human Services, Public Health, Aging & Appropriations Committees (February 22, 2016):

• Introduction by Commissioner Rod Bremby (video)
• Connecticut HUSKY Health:  Improving Outcomes, Enabling Independence and Integration, Controlling Costs (PowerPoint presentation) 
• Rebalancing of Long - Term Services & Supports (precis/summary)
  
• Medicaid Integration and Care Coordination Initiatives (infographic)

 

Connecticut Medicaid Leads the Way as National Medicaid Per-Member Cost Trend Lower Than Private Coverage, Medicare (update summary; news release and Connecticut Mirror coverage )

Protect & Provide:  Social Work Services (infographic)

Standing up for Children: Child Support Services (infographic)

Healthy People, Healthy State: Medicaid/HUSKY Health (infographic)

 MyPlaceCT.org -- Connect to Living Independently AND CaringCareers.org

MyPlaceCT.org is the State of Connecticut’s one-stop information and referral resource for Long-Term Services and Supports for older adults and individuals with disabilities. Here, you’ll find comprehensive, consumer-friendly information about services available to support home and community living. MyPlaceCT.org is also for families, friends and caregivers looking for resources and support for their loved ones. As a reliable source of independent, authorized information with no commercial agenda, MyPlaceCT.org offers helpful information about programs and services, providers and in-person help for independent living. Please visit www.MyPlaceCT.org . And we’d like to invite you to check out www.CaringCareers.org , the State of Connecticut’s new resource hub for in-home care careers. For background information, please visit our news release about the September 2016 launch of CaringCareers.org.