The New York State Department of Health (DOH) issued several sweeping recommendations in the first comprehensive report on its Regulatory Modernization Initiative (RMI). The report’s major recommendations include implementing measures to integrate primary care, behavioral care, and substance abuse treatment into a single setting, and delivering telehealth services to patients at any location, including their homes. If implemented, the recommendations would increase quality, reduce costs, and improve the health of New Yorkers, according to a DOH press release.
The RMI was launched in the summer of 2017 to reform State policies, regulations, and some statutes governing the licensure and oversight of health care services to make them more patient-centered and system-reformed focus.
The RMI tasked six workgroups of subject matter experts with reviewing specific services identified as needing reform, streamlining, or the removal of barriers to better coordinated care. Representatives from GNYHA, the Healthcare Association of New York State, GNYHA member hospitals, and other New York State stakeholders met last fall to discuss DOH-prepared briefing papers and develop draft recommendations.
A GNYHA staff representative participated in each of the workgroups, including Integrated Primary Care and Behavioral Health; Telehealth; Post-Acute Care Management Models; Cardiac Services; Off-Campus Emergency Departments; and Long-Term Care Need Methodologies and Innovative Models. The Long-Term Care Workgroup continues to meet and will submit its recommendations at a later date.
For details on specific recommendations, please see GNYHA’s Legal and Regulatory Bulletin (dated February 22). DOH’s report, “Spurring Health Care Innovation Through Regulatory Modernization: Putting Patients First,” can be found here.
For questions about the workgroups, please contact:
- Alison Burke: Integrated Primary Care and Behavioral Health, and Community Paramedicine Programs
- Zeynep Sumer King: Telehealth, Post-Acute Care Management Models, and Cardiac Services
- Susan Waltman: Off-Campus Emergency Departments, and the overall RMI initiative
- Scott Amrhein: Long-Term Care Need Methodologies and Innovative Models