With the late March board meeting and Annual Meeting prep, I didn’t send an update for a while but I’ll get back on schedule now!
Advocacy Update:
Kevin and Anni were tracking several issues near the end of the session so I’m going to forward Kevin’s update from the Saturday evening prior to the end of the session. It essentially captures what was ultimately approved. To highlight
a few things:
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The biggest disappointment was not getting anything for the 5% Campaign.
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The House position, which raised the spenddown standard from 75% FPL to 80% FPL in July of 2016, was passed. Although less than we hoped for this is a step in the right direction.
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A special thanks to Rep. Dean and Rep. Franson for their assistance on including an MA payment rate increase for home health physical therapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy by 10% beginning July 1, 2015.
Education Update:
We had more than 260 attendees at the Annual Meeting and received excellent reviews! Staff have reviewed the evaluations and began considering enhancements for next year during our de-briefing. With the exception of three sessions, participants
gave high marks to the sessions and loved the new venue.
I hope you’ll encourage your staff to attend our upcoming Medication Management/State Licensure program on June 23. This was developed based on member requests.
Organizational Update:
I’m pleased to announce that Susan Morgan will be joining the MHCA Board of Directors! Jay has certified the elections results and I have talked with both candidates. Susan is very excited and I think Andrea will be outstanding for a Team
Chair position. I have orientation scheduled with Susan.
Six members have accepted the invitation to our media training. We will be prepared for editorial visits that our PR consultant will be actively pursuing and other future opportunities. Those participating include: Jay Jones, Denise Edgett,
Anne Major, Andrea Jung (Elk River), Stephanie Keppers- Anderson (Duluth) and Kari Schafer (Rochester).
Although we haven’t had the media training yet, we did get a follow-up to the joint press release we did with the BBB Consumer tips info. Anne has agreed to do this one since it’s Fargo area media. I had to do a quick step to get us there.
For some reason, BBB had reached out to Kris Dudziak and CareProviders of MN. Thanks to Kris for alerting me to that. The BBB communications person apologized for the mix-up and we have made the connection! I have to admit…..I wasn’t too happy about Care Providers
possibly getting the coverage for our press release!!
Allison and I enjoyed our home visits with Integrated Home Care staff today! Jason is going tomorrow.
The EHR Task Force is making progress on creating a member resource. It’s been a great group of providers, vendors and Stratis Health working together to ensure we are providing the best information in a way that providers will understand.
I hope you all enjoy the long weekend!
Warm Regards,
Kathy Messerli
Executive Director
Minnesota HomeCare Association
Office: 651-635-0038 | Cell: 612-590-4180
MHCA Mission: MHCA represents and supports Minnesota home care providers committed to high quality home care services