State Indicator Pilot (SIP: The 16 State Study) conference call/January 27, l999

-Marie Danforth, CMHS Block Grant, spoke on getting a subcommittee of planners to work on issues related to planning. The State Indicator Pilot project will be scheduled for a plenary presentation at the State Planner meeting in Arlington, VA, June 12-15th; Vijay Ganju will also be putting together informaton on how Texas is using indicators in budgeting for the 12th meeting. Marie asked for subcommittee volunteers. Vijay Ganju, (and post-meeting) Kitty Hepfer, and Fred Hobbs expressed interest. Representatives from four of the states in the Five-State Study agree that a subcomittee of planners is a good idea, but that it would be helpful to include data people on the workgroup. A conference call will be organized for the subcommittee.

-Olinda González, Survey and Analysis Branch, announced that before February 15th continuation application packets will be sent out to the 16 SIP project PIs; year 2 non-competitive applications will be due at CMHS on April 15th.

Workgroup reports:

-Consumer Survey

Deb Kupfer reported on the Consumer Survey for Judy Hall--

-Most people have received a fax survey, and all but 2 states are doing some form of MHSIP survey, mostly on adults.

Ron Manderscheid: what is the level of comparability across these efforts?

Deb: Too early to tell; Judy has data for 12 states, sampling is very different and only 4-5 states have all NASMHPD framework covered; data from 2 states did not have the outcome item. Some states have not received the fax yet.

-Level of Functioning

Mary Smith:

Mary has emailed and then faxed survey to retrieve information on State assessment instruments; Responses are due Feb 5.

-Assertive Community Treatment and supported employment

John McGrew:

John sent a series of questions to listserv re: ACT and supportive employment--seven questions are asked about each indicator. There have been 6 State responses sent in. It was suggested that perhaps another mailing with deadline could be sent out. Discussed was a South Carolina ACT certification program, and Texas offered that it has MIS data elements and a form they use to monitor compliance with fidelity standards that can be shared.

-Penetration Rates

John Pandiani:

John has sent out request for information by Email, and has heard from 10 states. He has calculated penetration rates overall, and by age, gender, and race. Questions raised by John were other state hospital populations including forensic, dual diagnosis/MR and DD, and also questions about state use of facilities (other than State Hospitals) providing similar services that may need to be counted, such as SMHA-purchased services, subcontracted services, and Medicaid-paid services. John also mentioned interest in looking at diagnosis.

First, age categories were discussed, and it was decided to add categories for improved information--the age categories will now be 0-12,13-17, 18-21, 22-30, 31-46, 46-65, and 65 and older.

On additional services to be counted,

Vijay Ganju: What is the purview of the indicators to be: what the SMHA pays for, what the state pays for, what anyone else pays for?

Three categories were identified: state hospitals, inpatient beds in CMHCs, inpatient beds in private general hospital, all paid by SMHA-- unduplicate within each category (and another dataset across all categories);

Ron Manderscheid: wants to have a presentation on penetration rate at the National Conference on Mental Health Statistics. Others raised concerns re: comparability that need to be addressed before publishing results.

-Judy Hall-Consumer Survey-

Judy commented that, of the information she has, methods and sampling are very different and there are many comparability issues. Only 4 or 5 States have all of the indicators proposed in the framework. There is a possibility that some similar questions by States may be comparable or fit into the existing set, and this will need to be assessed. A subcommittee was formed for reviewing these different methodologies and related issues. (Texas, Colorado, Utah, and Illinois).

-Mederic McLaughlin, New York, proposed a grid for an impact analysis to move from original indicators in grant to NASMHPD indicators and Oryx requirements. They want to determine what stage of deployment of managed care and other initiatives states are involved in. They will send out the grid with a written description for us to discuss at next conference call.

-The next conference call will be 1-3 pm Eastern Standard Time on March 3. In terms of a summer meeting, Ron suggested having a meeting at the National Conference on Mental Health Statistics; others suggested having it with the Planners Conference, June 12-15.

Ron Manderscheid reviewed individual NASMHPD indicators with the group. Following are general comments gleaned from the indicator by indicator review:

On Access, Oklahoma mentioned a 'location of service' indicator. Ron Manderscheid suggested that this might provide a means to explain discrepancies between penetration rate and consumer perception of access.

John Pandiani has an appropriateness study that will be circulated; more info is on the NRI website.

The NASMHPD Adult Services Division is collecting definitions from all states (and best practice information) on ACT, supported employment and housing.

Ted Lutterman says that the NASMHPD indicator on atypical medications is being reported by many states for hospitals; Texas is one of the few States collecting the information in the community, and Vijay Ganju will report next time on how Texas collects this information.

Dorothy Webman may have information re: child welfare service requirements.

Ted Lutterman will follow-up on indicators of children's services, e.g., Oklahoma’s home-based services and location of service codes.

Virginia uses a Macro International-developed Family Svc questionnaire to get parent input.

Q3 (contact within 7 days of inpatient discharge) needs to have data in same format/categories as for penetration rate.

CMHS will send documents received from Vijay and others to Oklahoma to be added to the website.