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Tags Posts tagged with "SCO"

SCO

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Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash

The Specialty Telehealth and Assessment Team (STAT) is a 24/7 telehealth service that provides health assessments. The service is consultative and provides disability specific advice of when to best seek additional or in-person medical treatment for the participants. This is a service that occurs in the participant’s private home or residential home to help assess their need for medical attention.

This service does not duplicate any service that is available through the state plan, and, very importantly, this service is not intended to replace in-person exams. The goal is not to prevent people from going to the emergency room or seeing a physician in person when needed. It is a support that can help to alleviate the burden of going to the emergency department or urgent care when it is not absolutely necessary for the individual to be seen in person.

The STAT waiver service is provided as a monthly service and billed in monthly units. One unit equals one month at 55 dollars a unit. All individuals that are involved in an ID/A waiver, Person/Family Directed Support (PFDS) waiver, Community Living waiver, and the Consolidated waiver are eligible for this service. The STAT waiver service is available for individuals of all ages and all living situations as long as they are enrolled in one of the ID/A waivers. In order to access this service, STAT must be added to the ISP via a critical revision or at the time of the annual ISP and must be authorized by the administrative entity prior to the service being used. STAT costs are included in the annual limit for P/FDS and Community Living waivers.

STAT is a unique and specialized service. The physicians that provide this service are educated in the guidelines for the provision of health care to individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities. All staff who render the service have completed a specialized training curriculum on how to provide medical assessment, treatment interventions, and recommendations regarding the health care needs of individuals with intellectual disabilities, developmental disabilities, or autism. This service is provided and overseen by physicians who are licensed to practice medicine in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania or have appropriate reciprocity.

The STAT waiver service has been available since March of 2024 and has grown steadily since. There are currently over 5,500 individuals using the service with two providers available, StationMD and Senacare. The service has maintained approximately a 94% treat in place rate since it became available, saving time and resources by avoiding unnecessary Emergency Department and urgent care visits.

We encourage SCs to provide education to individuals, families, and teams about how the STAT service can help.

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The Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) has shared ODPANN 26-008. This communication is to inform all Adult Autism Waiver (AAW) Supports Coordination Organizations (SCO), whose last digit of their Master Provider Index (MPI) number is 6, 7, 8, or 9 as well as new SCOs who enrolled in the AAW during fiscal year 2024/25, that they must submit their qualification documentation to the Office of Developmental Programs (ODP), Bureau of Supports for Autism and Special Populations (BSASP) between February 1, 2026, through March 31, 2026.

Documentation must include a completed AAW SCO Qualification form and SCO Qualification Documentation Record, as well as any other required supporting documentation.

Please view the announcement for more details.

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The Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) has shared ODPANN 25-116. The purpose of this communication is to inform providers of Adult Autism Waiver (AAW) services and Supports Coordination Organizations (SCO) of the updated provider qualification process.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) require a statewide process to ensure providers are qualified to render services to waiver-funded individuals. The Provider Qualification Process described in the communication outlines the steps the provider must follow to meet these requirements, and the steps Supports Coordinators (SC) must take to transition individuals if needed. This communication does not describe the qualification process for AAW SCOs.

NOTE: The release of this communication obsoletes ODP Announcement 20-110 New Adult Autism Waiver (AAW) Provider Qualification Process.

Providers that are shared across Intellectual Disability/Autism (ID/A) and the AAW must complete the Provider Qualification processes with both their assigned Administrative Entity (AE) for the ID/A waivers and the Bureau of Supports for Autism and Special Populations (BSASP) for the AAW.

Please view the full announcement for complete details.

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The PA Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) hosted a Supports Coordination Organization (SCO) Forum to provide status updates and data related to the recently completed desk review for Performance-Based Contracting. All PBC submissions have been scored, and results will be emailed to SCOs shortly, with final results published on the DHS website in January 2026. The new contract cycle is effective from January 1, 2026, to June 30, 2027.

Pay-for-Performance (P4P) and Portal Feedback

  • P4P Updates: Capacity building investments continue, with $3.835 million available for Credentialing and another $3.835 million available for Technology. A total of 45 SCOs submitted for at least one of these two investments.
  • MyPBC Portal: ODP requested feedback on SCOs’ experience using the new MyPBC Portal for submissions.

Notification Letters and the Critical Resolution Process

Notification letters regarding determination are now being sent, which will include a list of any performance measures the SCO did not meet.

  • Mandatory QM Plans: SCOs with unmet measures are required to create and implement a Quality Management Plan (QMP) to meet the standards before the next PBC submission period.
  • Resolution Deadline is Strict: The most crucial detail shared is the deadline for challenging an unmet measure determination. SCOs will have only seven calendar days from the receipt of their determination letter to initiate the Resolution Process.
  • Process Guidance: The Resolution Process is strictly for submitting existing documentation that was inadvertently omitted or contained typographical errors to refute ODP’s determination. This is not an opportunity to create new materials solely to meet the standard, and newly created policies, plans, or comments on the process will not be reviewed.

Top Unmet Measures

The presentation included a breakdown of the top unmet measures across all SCOs, highlighting specific compliance challenges:

Measure Measure Description Number of SCOs Unmet Percent of SCOs Unmet
PCP.01.2 90% compliance with monitoring frequency by waiver type 38 73%
QDI.01.6 Restrictive procedure data is 86% accurate as compared to the most current BSP. 30 58%
RN.01 Register in PA Navigate Resource Platform as a CBO 15 23%

QDI (Quality Data Integrity) Measures: The purpose of QDI measures is to stress that SCOs are the primary source of data collection, and data integrity is essential for data-driven policies. ODP plans to drop these measures over time as performance improves.

  • For QDI.01.1 (Demographic Data), ODP focused on Completeness (86% threshold) this cycle, as checking for both ‘Complete AND Accurate’ resulted in nearly every SCO failing the measure. The threshold is set to increase to 93% for the FY 2027/28 contract cycle.
  • The target for PCP.01.2 (Monitoring Frequency Compliance) is 90% (P/FDS: once every three months; Consolidated/Community Living: once every two months). This threshold is also scheduled to increase to 93% in the FY 2027-2028 contract cycle.

Restrictive Procedures and Dissatisfaction Measures

  • Restrictive Procedures (RP): ODP presented details on the calculation for QDI.01.6, which compares the restrictive procedure checkbox in HCSIS against the most current Behavior Support Plan (BSP) summary text. Data showed a continued overall decrease in the rate of Restrictive Procedures incidents from 2022 to 2024.
  • Dissatisfaction Measure: For the Dissatisfaction Measure, ODP will utilize the data submitted by SCOs (the number of individuals who chose another SCO due to dissatisfaction and the reasons why) to establish a baseline for the measure and determine how to proceed with it in the future.

The presentation slide deck can be found here. SCO Providers are encouraged to continue to submit feedback and questions to ODP via the PBC Inbox.

For questions or comments, please contact Tim Sohosky.

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The Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) has published announcement ODPANN 25-096 to notify stakeholders that ODP has published the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) received about Supports Coordination Organization Performance-Based Contracting (SCO-PBC). The FAQ resource has been developed from questions submitted during webinar summits, virtual office hours, and to the PBC Resource Account. Questions have been categorized by topic and performance measures.

The FAQ can be accessed on MyODP at the SCO Frequently Asked Questions web page.

SCOs should continue to send questions via email so ODP can ensure they are answered consistently.

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The Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) has shared communication ODPANN 25-095 and its accompanying attachments. This communication advises stakeholders of a change to the Cycle 3, Year 1 (C3Y1) Quality Assessment & Improvement (QA&I) Tools. The following questions from the QA&I C3Y1 Tools have been removed due to a high volume of stakeholder inquiries related to evaluation expectations:

  • AE Question #1 – The AE engages in activities, or has a written policy, to improve racial equity performance.
  • SCO Question #4 – The SCO engages in activities, or has a written policy, to improve racial equity performance.
  • Provider Question #4 – The Provider engages in activities, or has a written policy, to improve racial equity performance.

View the attachments below:

Please review the announcement and attachments for additional information on the changes.

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The Office of Developmental Program (ODP) has begun posting the Supports Coordination Organization (SCO) Performance-Based Contracting (PBC) Measures on Docushare. Please note that all reports are compiled by MPI, not by Service Location.

The SCO PBC Measures report is specific to entities providing ID Waivers and TSM. If your SCO does not have a report available, feel free to reach out for clarification.

Some SCOs may currently experience access issues due to recent employee role changes that were not accompanied by updated DocuShare access requests to ODP. If this applies to your organization, please contact us so we can assist.

If you have any questions about the report, please reach out to the ODP Data Analysis team via email.

Thank you for your continued collaboration.

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The Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) has finalized the new quarterly Supports Coordination Organization’s (SCO) Performance-Based Contracting (PBC) Measures data reports, which will be available in DocuShare no later than October 10, 2025.

Updated reporting includes:

  • SCO PBC Measures Quarterly Review – A new report providing a comprehensive overview of PBC measures, with a focus on:
    • Employment;
    • Continuum of Services (Residential Services & Non-Residential Services);
    • PUNS; and
    • Technology Utilization.

ODP will send a follow-up notification once the reports are posted. Please ensure that designated staff within your organization have access to DocuShare and are prepared to retrieve and review these reports.

Please contact your ODP Regional Office with any questions.

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Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash

The Office of Developmental Programs (ODP) has shared ODPANN 25-090. The Supports Coordination Organization (SCO) data submission portal for Performance-Based Contracting (PBC) is now available. All SCOs must complete their PBC submissions and, if desired, provide information to be considered for Pay-for-Performance (P4P) initiatives via the MyPBC Data Submission Portal. The Portal will be available until November 1, 2025, at 11:59 pm. Identified SCO Business Partner users will receive an email with directions for accessing the MyPBC Portal for their data submissions.

Please view the announcement for additional information and details.

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