OPPOSITIONAL DEFIANT DISORDER: March 2009

Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Help Address the Crisis in Access to Acute Inpatient Care

Help Address the Crisis in Access to Acute Inpatient Care

March 31, 2009

The new NAMI Grading the States 2009 report contains important new findings on the depth of the crisis in access to acute inpatient psychiatric care across the nation. Among the key findings in the NAMI report:

Nearly 127,000 inpatient beds have been lost since 2000 and more than 197,000 since 1990,
There are now fewer than 10.8 beds per 1,000 per adults living with serious mental illness, and
Only 11 states in NAMI's survey were able to share any type of data on how long it takes to get an inpatient psychiatric bed through an emergency room and 8 states were unable to report on the actual number of inpatient beds in their state.

Grading the States contains a number of policy recommendations to address this crisis in access to acute inpatient psychiatric care. Among these are addressing the Medicaid Institutions for Mental Disease (IMD) exclusion. This longstanding and discriminatory policy prohibits the use of federal Medicaid dollars for services for adults (ages 22-64) in psychiatric hospitals. The IMD exclusion serves as a barrier not only to reimbursing care in psychiatric hospitals, but also to implementing home and community-based waiver services that have been very helpful to other Medicaid populations such as people with developmental disabilities.

Click here to view a copy of NAMI's Grading the States 2009 report.

Act Now!

NAMI is supporting federal legislation to address the IMD exclusion with two specific bills now before Congress:

1) Complete repeal of the IMD exclusion (HR 619). Send a letter to your House member in support of HR 619 now!
2) Authorization of a demonstration program to lift the IMD exclusion for emergency psychiatric services (HR 1415). Send a letter to your House member in support of HR 1415 now!

Since these bills are moving on separate tracks, advocates are urged to send individual letters on both bills.

NAMI E-News Alerts are electronic newsletters provided free of charge as a public service. With more than 1,100 state and local affiliates, NAMI is the nation's largest grassroots organization dedicated to improving the lives of people with severe mental illnesses. Contributions to support our work can be made online.

If you do not wish to receive further E-News Alerts, please click here, sign in and uncheck the box next to E-News. If you have any questions, concerns, or comments, please send an email to enews@nami.org.

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Friday, March 27, 2009

NAMI Advocate E-newsletter: March 2009

NAMI Advocate e-newsletter, March 2009
In this issue: Grading the States 2009: Nation Scores a D; Movies and Music and NAMI's 2009 National Convention; The Phenomanel Growth of In Our Own Voice; Have You Shared NAMI Today?; NAMI Bookshelf; and more... Read this issue online.

New Report:Mental Health Care System Gets a D

The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has released its new Grading the States report, assessing the nation's public mental health care system for adults. The national average grade is D. Fourteen states improved their grades since the last report card three years ago. Twelve states fell backwards.The report comes at a time when state budget cuts are threatening mental health care overall.
Read more | Order Hard Copy | Online Report

NAMI Convention, July 5-9: Get Ready for Movies & Music!

Don't miss these exciting special events at this year's convention: Advance screening of When Medicine Got It Wrong the PBS documentary about the NAMI movement; live performance by jazz musician and NAMI advocate Joyce Cooling; and a special screening of The Soloist, starring Robert Downey, Jr. and Jamie Foxx, a true story about the redemptive power of music and friendship.
Read more

Have You Shared NAMI Today?

NAMI.org visitors are sharing articles and resources with their family and peers across the top social networking sites, such as Facebook, mySpace and Twitter. Find out how you can use easy tools on NAMI.org to help make NAMI a household name.
Read more

In Our Own Voice: Living with Mental Illness

In Our Own Voice is a unique public education presentation offered nationwide by trained NAMI members who live with mental illness. The program has witnessed phenomenal growth in the past year, reaching more than 46,000 individuals in 2008.
Read more

NAMI Bookshelf

This month:Freeing Your Child from Negative Thinking: Powerful, Practical Strategies to Build a Lifetime of Resilience, Flexibility, and Happiness, Mental Illness and Your Town: 37 Ways for Communities to Help and Heal and Straight Talk about Psychiatric Medications for Kids.
Read More

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The NAMI Advocate e-newsletter (formerly NAMI Connection) brings periodic, lively news and stories of interest to NAMI supporters, complementing the NAMI Advocate magazine which is published three times per year for NAMI members.

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