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A pdf version of this newsletter can be found at http://www.pascenter.org/newsletter/CenterforPASBulletinApr06.pdf Previous newsletters can be found at http://www.pascenter.org/newsletter/index.php
Center for Personal Assistance Services BulletinApril 2006 - Volume 3, Issue 2In this issue: 1) SAVE THE DATE - Center for PAS State of the Science Conference 2) CMS Announces Opening of National Direct Service Workforce Resource Center 3) Center for PAS seeks nominations of promising practices in workplace PAS 4) On the Center for PAS website 5) Money Follows the Person enacted in New Mexico 6) Paper on HIV/AIDS waivers published 7) Primer on Medicare and Medicaid released 8) Background paper on Medicaid HCSB Waiver Program published 9) Three reports published from the AARP Public Policy Institute 10) Studies on keeping caregivers in the profession released 11) Webcast reveals personal experiences with institutional bias in the Long Term Care system in the U.S. 12) On-line course on Olmstead-Transition from Nursing Homes to Community scheduled 13) "Working Together" to be used in Georgia and Arizona 14) National Clearinghouse on the Direct Care Workforce now has section in Spanish 15) National Conference on Employment of Lawyers with Disabilities to be held in May 16) SELECTED CONFERENCES DURING April, May, and June 2006 1) SAVE THE DATE - Center for Personal Assistance Services State of the Science Conference The Center for Personal Assistance Services will host its State of the Science Conference, entitled "Meeting the Nation's Need for Personal Assistance Services: State of the Science" on April 26, 2007 at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. More information will be available soon on the PAS Center website. For the PAS Center website, go to http://www.pascenter.org 2) CMS Announces Opening of National Direct Service Workforce Resource Center The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced the opening of the National Direct Service Workforce Resource Center on March 24, 2006. The following is the email announcement. CMS is pleased to announce the opening of the National Direct Service Workforce Resource Center. CMS created the Resource Center to respond to the large and growing shortage of workers who provide direct care and personal assistance to people with disabilities and older adults in the community. The direct service workforce includes direct support professionals, personal attendants, home health aides, certified nurse assistants, and others. The Resource Center strives to support efforts to improve the quality of the workforce and to enhance recruitment and retention of direct support professionals by providing information, resources and assistance to state and local governments, policy makers, researchers, employers, workers, and consumers. 1-877-822-2647 The Resource Center Offers…
The Resource Center Provides Assistance To… Any state or local government, not-for-profit organization, employer or professional in the field can access the Center’s resources and expert advice through the website or toll-free telephone number. State Medicaid Agencies can apply for in- depth technical assistance (TA) on an annual basis. CMS is specifically targeting this TA to State Medicaid Agencies because of the key role they play in quality assurance, worker education, supervisor education for workers and consumers, wages and benefits, and provider reimbursement. States can apply for assistance with existing initiatives aimed at improving the home and community based direct service workforce, or for assistance with a new initiative. Visit the Resource Center website (www.dswresourcecenter.org) for more information. The Resource Center’s Team of Experts Includes…
3) Center for PAS seeks nominations of promising practices in provision of workplace PAS The Center for Personal Assistance Services is seeking nominations from private and public organizations for promising practices in the provision of Workplace Personal Assistance Services (WPAS). WPAS includes task-related assistance at work such as sign language interpreters, readers, assistance with work-related travel and may include personal care-related assistance such as helping someone accessing the restroom, eating, or drinking while at work. If your organization, or an organization you know, has provided WPAS to an employee with a disability, we want to hear about it. We will help share promising practices with other business. To nominate an organization's promising practice, please go to: http://157.182.245.35:8555 4) On the Center for PAS website New resources are available on the Center for PAS website (http://www.pascenter.org/) Two reports on Home and Community Services have been updated for 2006. The following reports (and accompanying tables) are available online:
For more information on Home and Community Based Services, go to http://www.pascenter.org/home_and_community/ An update of the estimated number of PAS workers and workers per person with self- care difficulty from the American Community Survey is now available on the Center for PAS website. Data is available by state on the state pages as well. To retrieve the data by state, select the
following link: Number of Home and Personal Care Workers
5) Money Follows the Person enacted in New Mexico The New Mexico state legislature has passed and New Mexico's Governor recently has signed Money Follows the Person legislation for the state. The Money Follows The Person Act will allow a person in a nursing facility to choose community living, and have the money that has supported the person in the facility to follow the person to the community. To retrieve a press release, go to http://www.aapd-dc.org/News/mfp/nmpassesmfp.htm 6) Paper on HIV/AIDS waivers published PAS Center researchers have published a paper on HIV/AIDS waivers in the AIDS and Public Policy Journal. This paper presents data on the trends in Medicaid 1915(c) HCBS waivers serving individuals with HIV/AIDS. A study on the public cost efficiency of such waivers is also presented in the paper. For more information, go to http://www.pascenter.org/publications/publication_home.php?id=361 7) Primer on Medicare and Medicaid released The Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured has published a new report summarizing policy interactions and linkages between Medicare and Medicaid, two federal programs which provide supports to over 7 million disabled people. services elderly and and disabled people. To retrieve the report, go to http://www.kff.org/medicaid/7468.cfm 8) Background paper on Medicaid HCSB Waiver Program published The National Health Policy Forum at the George Washington University has published a background paper that examines the historical and legislative background of long term care in the home and community. To retrieve the report, go to http://www.nhpf.org/pdfs_bp/BP_HCBS.Waivers_03-03-06.pdf 9) Three reports published from the AARP Public Policy Institute The American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) has published three reports relating to home and community based services. The first report, entitled "Pulling Together: Administrative and Budget Consolidation of State Long-Term Care Services" examines the consolidated agency approach to delivering publicly-funded long-term care, whereby programs, policies and budgets are all subsumed into one state agency. Using case studies from several states, this report provides a checklist of steps toward consolidation for policymakers. The authors are Wendy Fox-Grage, Barbara Coleman, and Dann Milne. To retrieve the report, go to http://www.aarp.org/research/longtermcare/programfunding/2006_05_state_ltc.html The second report provides case studies from three states (SC, WA, WI) to show ways of improving the quality of home care by using a more person-centered approach. This report, written by Donna Folkemer and Barbara Coleman, is titled "Home Care Quality: Emerging State Strategies to Deliver Person-Centered Services.’" To retrieve the report, go to http://www.aarp.org/research/health/carequality/2006_07_hcc.html "Public Funding and Support for Assistive technologies for Persons with Disabilities" by Marc Freiman, William C. Mann, Jessica Johnson, Shin-yi Lin and Catherine Locklear examines the provision of assistive technology, describing programs and regulations which cover it (e.g., Medicare and Medicaid) and analyzing the role that private sector programs play in supplementing publicly-funded provision. To retrieve the report, go to http://www.aarp.org/research/longtermcare/programfunding/2006_04_assist.html 10) Studies on keeping caregivers in the profession released A gap is growing between the need for care and the caregivers available to provide the care. One possible new source of qualified and motivated direct-care workers is in the pool of caregivers recruited by Medicaid- funded programs that pay for consumer- directed care, such as California's In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) program. IHSS supports home care clients who recruit, hire, and supervise their own personal assistance workers. Most of the people they hire are friends or relatives who might not have considered direct-care work if their loved one had not needed them. Two new studies from the Better Jobs Better Care research program, one by Ted Benjamin and the other by Candace Howes, look at what makes some of those caregivers stay in the profession and others leave once their loved one no longer needs their assistance. They also recommend things states and employers can do - including offering health insurance and wages of at least $10 an hour to encourage more of these caregivers to remain in the direct-care workforce. For more information, go to: http://www.directcareclearinghouse.org/n_news_det.jsp?res_id=198010&res_type=6&txn_type= 11) Webcast reveals personal experiences with institutional bias in the Long Term Care system in the U.S. A webcast was held on March 19 entitled "Real People-Real Voices". Presented by the ADAPT Community, this webcast was part of testimony given by individuals with disabilities who have been institutionalized in nursing facilities and similar institutions. They shared their personal experiences of the institutional bias in the American Long-Term Care System. This testimony was before a panel consisting of representatives from the Department of Health and Human Services Office on Disability; National Council on Disability; American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD); National Disability Rights Network (NDRN), ADAWatch and the National Council on Independent Living (NCIL). To see an overview, a news release, a transcript of the webcast, and the archived webcast itself, go to http://www.ilru.org/html/training/webcasts/archive/2006/03-19-ADAPT.htm 12) New on-line course on Olmstead-Transition from Nursing homes to Community scheduled An on-line training course on "Olmstead- Transition from Nursing Homes to Community" has been scheduled for June 523, 2006 on the IL Net training and technical assistance project for centers for independent living and statewide independent living councils. Intended for Center for Independent Living (CIL) and Statewide Independent Living Council (SILC) staff, executives and board members, this course will provide participants with an in-depth perspective on assisting people with disabilities as they make the transition from nursing home to community. The course will address key phases of transition and provide useful information for working with people who experience several secondary disabilities that often have an effect on transition. The registration deadline is May 26, 2006. For more information, go to http://www.ilru.org/html/training/online/class_transition.htm 13) "Working Together" to be used in Georgia and Arizona The Shepherd Center, in conjunction with the Georgia Department of Human Services will use Working Together: Consumer Personal Assistance Training, a resource developed by InfoUse and available on the Center for PAS website, in trainings to field staff. The staff will receive paper copies of the resource to use with people with disabilities in the field to help in bolstering self-direction capabilities. Shepherd has already successfully used the materials in training with the Georgia Department of Community Health for case managers in their program who are teaching consumers self-direction as an option. For more information, contact Sharron Kirby at the Shepherd Center at sharron_kirby@shepherd.org. The Arizona Statewide Independent Living Council has a goal to distribute 500 paper copies of the Working Together website in the field as part of their effort to train people with disabilities in remote rural areas about personal assistance services and self- direction. For more information, contact Tony DiRienzi, Executive Director of the Arizona SILC at silctonyd@qwest.net. To retrieve Working Together, go to http://www.pascenter.org/pas_users/index_pas_training.php 14) National Clearinghouse on the Direct Care Workforce now has section in Spanish The Direct-Care Worker Information Center, a section of the National Clearinghouse on the Direct Care Workforce, is now available in Spanish. Intended for direct-care workers whose primary language is Spanish, the section is divided into four areas:
To access the Spanish section of the Clearinghouse, go to http://www.directcareclearinghouse.org/esp_index.jsp 15) National Conference on Employment of Lawyers with Disabilities to be held in May The first National Conference on the Employment of Lawyers with Disabilities will be held May 22-23, 2006 in Washington, D.C. The American Bar Association (ABA) President's Office, the ABA Commission on Mental and Physical Disability Law and the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) are co-sponsoring the event. This Conference is appropriate for lawyers, law students, law schools and any organization that employs lawyers. The goal is to help expand opportunities for lawyers with disabilities in all legal employment sectors. For more information, go to http://www.pascenter.org/news/news_home.php?id=63 16) SELECTED CONFERENCES DURING April, May, and June 2006 For more detail about these conferences, go to: http://pascenter.org/conferences/index.php April April 10 - April 11, 2006 April 10 - April 12, 2006 April 19 - April 22, 2006 April 25 - April 27, 2006 May May 08 -May 09, 2006 May 08 -May 10, 2006 May 11, 2006 May 19 -May 21, 2006 May 22 -May 25, 2006 May 22 -May 23, 2006 May 31 -June 03, 2006 May 31 -June 02, 2006 June June 25 - June 27, 2006 June 28 - June 30, 2006 The Center for Personal Assistance Services provides research, training, dissemination and technical assistance on issues of personal assistance services (PAS) in the United States. Personal assistance services (PAS) refer to help provided to people with disabilities to assist them with tasks essential for daily living. These tasks include bathing, dressing, getting around, toileting, eating, shopping, remembering things, and other activities. PAS, along with assistive technology such as wheelchairs, text readers, and hearing aides, help people with disabilities to participate in activities at home, at work, and in the community. The purpose of this newsletter is to provide the latest news on issues relating to formal and informal PAS, home & community- based services, the PAS workforce, and workplace PAS within and outside of the Center. Detail about the Center staff and advisors can be found at http://www.pascenter.org/about/
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