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RCPA staff and Conference Committee members are grateful to all of our attendees, speakers, sponsors, and exhibitors for a great experience at the Hershey Lodge this past September. We are happy to report that we had 800 people in attendance throughout the week!
Participants were able to hear from over 150 speakers, and RCPA was able to record many of the workshops as well as the keynote and plenary sessions. The recordings are available to attendees who previously registered for the conference in the mobile app. For those who are interested in earning CEs, you can earn over 110 credits!
We were honored to host 86 exhibit booths in our Connections Hall, representing a variety of services and products from pharmacy initiatives to technology, furniture to HR services, insurance and electronic health record systems to education, and so much more.
Our conference in 2025 will be held in September once again! We ask you to save the date — the 2025 RCPA Conference will be held September 9 – 12, 2025.
The Pennsylvania Department of Aging has released information about the 2024 Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Disorders (ADRD) virtual forum. The forum, “Brain Health and Beyond: Taking Care of Your Brain as You Age,” is scheduled for November 7, 2024, from 9:00 am – 12:30 pm.
The agenda for the forum is located here. To participate in the virtual forum, registration is required.
Questions regarding the virtual forum should be directed to Heidi Champa, Aging Services Specialist, via email.
The Office of Long-Term Living (OLTL) is presenting a live, interactive, 6-session webinar series on housing issues from November 5, 2024, to December 10, 2024, every Tuesday, from 11:00 am – 12:30 pm. The webinars will include targeted content as well as Q&A sessions with housing experts and OLTL staff.
The webinar series targets Service Coordinators, Managed Care Organizations, and Service Coordination Entity support staff who assist program participants in securing and maintaining affordable, accessible housing through Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS). The target audience for these webinars includes individuals and organizations who provide long-term services and supports for older Pennsylvanians and people with physical disabilities.
Presenters
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) held a training session on the Incident Management Systems and Critical Incident Reporting Provisions of the Medicaid Access Final Rule on September 16, 2024. The webinar recording, transcript, and slides are now available on the Training Series: HCBS Provisions of the Medicaid Access Final Rule web page. Register for upcoming sessions in the training series here.
The Department of Health’s Brain Injury Advisory Board, established under section 1252 of the Federal Traumatic Brain Injury Act of 1996 (42 U.S.C. § 300d-52), will hold their next public meeting on Friday, November 1, 2024, from 10:00 am to 3:00 pm. The meeting will be held in person at the Pennsylvania Training and Technical Assistance Network, 6340 Flank Drive, Harrisburg, PA 17112 in the Cambria conference room.
Meeting materials will be sent out before the meeting and will also be available on the Board’s website and at the meeting location. Questions should be directed to Nicole Johnson.
The Department of Health’s Head Injury Program (HIP) strives to ensure that eligible individuals who have a traumatic brain injury receive high quality rehabilitative services aimed at reducing functional limitations and improving quality of life. The Board assists the department in understanding and meeting the needs of persons living with acquired brain injuries, both traumatic and nontraumatic, and their families. This quarterly meeting provides updates on a variety of topics, including the number of people served by HIP. In addition, meeting participants will discuss budgetary and programmatic issues, community programs relating to traumatic and nontraumatic brain injuries, and available advocacy opportunities.
For additional information or for persons with a disability who wish to attend the meeting and require an auxiliary aid, service, or other accommodation to do so, contact Nicole Johnson, Division of Community Systems Development and Outreach, 717-772-2763. For individuals with speech and/or hearing impairments, contact V/TT 717-783-6514 or the Pennsylvania Hamilton Relay Service at 800-654-5984. This meeting is subject to cancellation without notice.
The Office of Long-Term Living (OLTL) has announced that they are reopening the calendar year (CY) 2023 rate study survey in order to gather responses from providers that were not able to submit previously. The rate study survey is for the following Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS):
Access the survey here. Please complete the survey for CY 2023, which spans from January 1, 2023, through December 31, 2023, unless otherwise specified. Please only complete the survey if you did not previously participate. The reopening of the survey will ensure every provider has ample time to offer input to broaden and improve the resulting analysis. The survey will remain open until Friday, November 15, 2024.
It is highly recommended that you review the survey questions before starting the survey. This survey tool does not allow individuals to save and go back to answer questions. Have all your agency information such as wages, employee information, and financial statements readily available. This will help you to submit accurate information when answering the questions.
This survey is one piece of the targeted rate review and is intended to collect current provider rate and wage data and general feedback on the challenges of providing these services. The information collected in this survey will be used to assist in developing a point of reference for the rate range to evaluate current payment rates. In addition to results from this survey, the review will include payment rate information from Managed Care Organizations (MCO) in OLTL claims data, recent legislative policies, department expectations, and other data obtained from publicly available sources.
HCBS providers that delivered multiple service categories during CY 2023 should fill out this survey separately for each service category you delivered.
HCBS providers that did not deliver any of the service categories listed above should disregard this survey. OLTL is partnering with Mercer to perform a rate study exclusive to the service categories listed above at this time.
The information collected for this survey will be used for both this rate study and to meet the requirements of House Bill 1300 from the 2023–2024 Pennsylvania General Assembly regular session. The information you provide will remain confidential and private and will only be shared publicly through high-level summary reports that do not include provider-level detail. Please comply with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and do not share any protected health information (PHI) within your survey responses.
If you have any questions or need assistance, please reach out via email.