Justin's Blog

 Posts Tagged ‘Therap for States’

These are very exciting times here at Therap.  Having just welcomed Michelle Saunders as someone with a huge amount of experience on the provider side of things, I am now delighted to welcome Peter O’Meara who will be working with us on the state side of things.

Our interactions with states have become more and more important over the years, not only as we make sales directly to states, but also as we work on billing interfaces, electronic signatures, and having our forms and processes approved all around the country.  What Jason did in Georgia recently is a great example of this.

Over the coming weeks, Peter will be at the Therap Conference in Kansas City and with me as the NASDDDS Conference in Sacramento, California, so me sure to welcome him aboard.

Peter has worked in the field of Developmental and Intellectual Disabilities since 1966 assisting and supporting individuals and their families in a variety of positions from volunteer and direct care to social worker and administrator. He served for seventeen years in the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare and ten years for the Massachusetts Department of Mental Retardation and for the last sixteen years was the Commissioner of Developmental Services for the State of Connecticut. He has seen the positive evolution of the system of supports and services to one that is now focused on self direction and determination and one that abounds with a host of choices that are highly individualized. He has also served on the Boards of a number of provider organizations over the years and understands the pressures those organizations are under.

He has been primarily involved in the policy development and implementation aspects of service delivery from the perspective of the role and responsibilities of government entities to develop systems of care that are responsive to the needs of consumers but permit the governmental agencies to foster best practices. Additionally, Peter has been involved in developing systems that assure fiscal integrity and program oversight with a specific emphasis on reducing risk and jeopardy for program participants.

Peter understands the importance of the partnership between the providers of services and the government agencies that fund, support and oversee the system. In these challenging fiscal times the services and tools Therap offers to both providers and government is invaluable in managing the systems of care but more importantly maintaining and enhancing the quality of outcomes for participants.

:: Justin ::

Jim, Sazzad, Asif, Jeff, Jordan, and I have spent the remainder of this week between Lincoln and Omaha.

We’ve been working with folk’s at the state on the referral process (much more about that here), annual plans, and individual budgeting.

We’re going to have some really exciting stuff coming out here over the next few months, be sure to watch this space for much more.

We have continued to learn much more about radio towers courtesy of Jim, the current conversation is surrounding how one changes a light-buld at the top of a 2,000 foot tower.  Answers on a postcard please!

:: Justin ::

UPDATE:

Thanks Jim!

Today Jeff and I followed up on the training we did in Lincoln, Nebraksa for State Service Coordinators by conducting a webinar for providers.

If you missed it you can watch it here:

You can also sign up for next week’s repeat session on our Nebraska page.

You can find our support materials here.

:: Justin ::

I had been doing really well with my whole blog-post-a-day thing, but last week’s travel schedule finally got to me!

There are though a few things I really should catch you up on.

One of the most exciting was the day that Jeff, Sazzad, Pushpita, Naim, and i spent with the folks in Boone County, Missouri. We have been implementing our Oversight Accounts in a number of states for a while now, but thanks to a few counties in Oregon and Missouri (along with some boards in Colorado) we are finding out how well the system works in a whole new role.

Working with counties is proving to be a very interesting challenge/opportunity in many ways.  I a lot of respects they operate like a small state.  However the providers who are within a county and fall under that oversight account may well provide services in multiple local counties so it is imperitive that individuals are only linked to the right county (and possibly the right state or multi-state provider!).

What is increadibly exciting to me is how well our Oversight Accounts and Therap for States and Counties deals with all these complications to make sure that the right data is shared with the right people across providers and agencies.

And now with the new 1115 People First Waiver in New York it looks like we have a whole new environment to implement in.

Given quite how many years we have been working on all the cross provider issues, it is very exciting to see it all coming together.

:: Justin ::

Jeff has been trying out video blogging over on the Midwest Blog.

Not to be outdone, I videod our conversation on my (Android) phone while he did on his (iOS) one.

What do you think?  Is this a good way to get information out there?  It was certainly easy enough to do.  Or is it just too scary?

Take a look here

:: Justin ::

Today Sazzad and I finished two days of very productive meetings getting ready for going live with a host of new features in North Dakota in the new year. Be sure to keep an eye on the North Dakota page for timelines and training.

As well as the State and County functionality that we will be bringing out, 2012.0 also includes our next step towards CCHIT certification.  Two of the features I am very excited about are Care Plans and Individual History.  These are premium modules which will be sold as part of our CCHIT/Electronic Health Record (EHR) package.

The Care Plan module will include a moderated Global Library:

As well as the ability to document notes and reviews of plans.

The Individual History brings together existing modules such as Medication History and Allergies and then adds features such as Medical History, Family History, and Social History.  I think this is going to be a great addition.

Look for a beta release that you can test for yourself around December 15th

:: Justin ::

Having been stuck in Albuquerque last week due to a high winds, I am now in Bismarck where it is awfully cold (10 deg F) and snowy – perfect weather for Sazzad.

We’re here for a couple of days of meeting with the North Dakota state team.  We have a whole bunch of really exciting things coming out here (and elsewhere) in January’s 2012.0 release – there should be a beta release of this in a week or so.

Today we’ve been working on Referral, Slot Management, and Overall Service Plans.

It’s exciting stuff!

:: Justin ::

Sazzad and I are here in North Dakota, working with the folks in the State office on the next phase of our implementation.

Thanks to individual unification, this is where it gets really interesting and very exciting (once in a while it ties your brain in knots too!)

We have now developed the Overall Service Plan for North Dakota.  This is an annual plan document that can be collaboratively written by state and provider staff, passing back an forward between their accounts in a seemless, HIPAA compliant dance.

We’ll be adding to this an amazing referall process that I think is going to have the same impact on states and counties that T-Logs have had on providers.  It’s a very exciting time to be part of Therap.

:: Justin ::

This weekend we released Therap 9.1.13 with a whole bunch of updates.  It’s another great reminder to be sure that you are looking at our Release Notes

Individual Data Updates

Marking Individuals as ‘Deceased’

Individuals can now be marked as deceased. A ‘Mark As Deceased’ button has been introduced which is available at the bottom of the Individual Data page. To mark an Individual as deceased, users will need to click on the ‘Mark As Deceased’ button. On clicking the button, users will be directed to the Mark Individual as Deceased page where users need to enter the Date of Death of Individuals. 

 

Once an Individual is marked as deceased, the Individual’s status will be updated to Deceased.

Removing Individuals from enrolled Programs

While discharging an Individual or marking an Individual as deceased, users can now remove the Individual from the enrolled Program(s) by checking the Remove Individual From Enrolled Program(s)? check-box. If it is left unchecked, then the Individual’s status will beDischarged or Deceased but s/he will still remain enrolled in the Program(s). 

Individual and Shared Contacts List

Users will now be able to view two new columns - Fax and Agency under the Individual Contacts area under the Contacts section on the Individual Data page. 

 

The Title column has been added to the Shared Contacts area of the Contacts section on the Individual Data page. The Organization column has been renamed to Organization Name which is now the first column on the Shared Contacts list.

Sample Excel Help file to import Individuals from Excel

The Help spreadsheet available on the sample Excel file for importing Individuals from Excel has been updated with detailed information regarding the valid values of the required fields as well as the optional fields of the Individual Data page. For Multi Provider Users, the valid values for the Oversight Agency has been added to the Help spreadsheet. A new spreadsheet - ID Type has been added to the sample Excel file where users will find the ID Types and Additional ID Types that must match while importing Individuals into the system. 

SComm Updates

Individual Care SComm Role

A new Role - Individual Care SComm has been introduced. This Role will enable users to send only Individual Care type SComm messages to the users who have particular Individuals in their Caseload. 

 

Users with the Individual Care SComm Role will also be able to send feedback messages to Therap Customer Support via SComm module.

SComm Messages in Trash Folder

Users will now be able to select the duration for which SComm messages should be shown in the Trash folder from the Settings section of the Secure Communications (SComm) module. The maximum limit to keep the SComm messages in the Trash folder is 2 months. 

Multi Provider User Specific Updates

T-Log and GER Review Counts

Multi Provider users will now be able to view T-Log counts as well as GER Review counts on their Oversight Agency account FirstPage. 

Filter Multi-Provider Event Summaries by Providers

Multi Provider users will now be able to filter Multi-Provider Event Summaries by Providers from the Management Summaries section on the Oversight Agency account FirstPage. 

Link Individuals with Oversight ID

The feature to link Multi Provider Individuals by assigning Oversight ID is now available under the Multi-Provider Individual section on the Oversight Agency account FirstPage. 

Training Management System Update

Users’ Employee ID have been added to the Training Profile page of the Training Profile & Requirements report. 

Billing Reconciliation Report

Two new fields named Claim ID and Transaction ID have been added to the Reconciliation Report Search page. 

One of the very cool things about Individual Unification in Therap 9.1 is that we now have unified SComm inbox for mutil-providers users (States and Multi-State Providers).

In order to be able to use this feature, both the sender and the recipient need to have Multi-Provider SComm enabled in their privileges.

This setting is defaulted to being enabled for Oversight Agencies, however, for Linked Providers, you will need to go in and enable this for any user that you want to be able to communicate with users at the Oversight Agency.

Providers in Montana who are should take particular note that their staff will only be able to send SComms to State and Case Managment users after this option has been enabled.

:: Justin ::