Mental
Health Association in New York State, Inc. |
Friday Fax from Albany
TWIN SISTERS PAMELA SPIRO WAGNER AND CAROLYN S. SPIRO, M.D., AUTHORS OF DIVIDED MINDS, TO KEYNOTE MHANYS’ AWARDS DINNER AND CONFERENCE ON OCT. 20-21: MHANYS has recently confirmed that our keynote speakers for our October 21st Conference at the Marriott Hotel in Albany will be twin sisters, Pamela Spiro Wagner and Carolyn Spiro, M.D. They are the authors of the recently released and already best selling book - Divided Minds - Twin Sisters and Their Journey Through Schizophrenia. It is the moving story of two sisters - one with schizophrenia and the other who is a psychiatrist. They are going to be featured on Good Morning America on August 31st and in the October edition of Readers Digest. Their book has already received excellent reviews in People magazine and Publishers Weekly. For additional information on MHANYS’ Conference or MHANYS’ Awards Dinner on October 20th at which the award winning documentary Out of the Shadow will be featured, please call (518) 434-0493 ext. 22.
GERIATRIC MENTAL HEALTH ACT SIGNED BY GOVERNOR: On Tuesday, Governor Pataki signed into law the Geriatric Mental Health Act (A.7672/S.4742), which was passed by both houses of the Legislature earlier this year. This law will help promote innovation and establish an inter-agency planning process, laying the groundwork for meeting the mental health needs of the baby boom generation as they become elderly New Yorkers. Congratulations are due to the Center for Policy and Advocacy of The Mental Health Associations of NYC and of Westchester’s Michael Friedman and Kim Steinhagen. Through their leadership, they led the Geriatric Mental Health Alliance on a successful campaign to see this bill through to become law in what is considered an extraordinarily short timeframe of just one year. Thanks are due to Senator Spano and Assemblymember Peter Rivera for sponsoring this important legislation and to Governor Pataki for signing the bill into law. Following is the press release issued by the Mental Health Associations of New York City and Westchester. See also the article that follows in the In The News section from the Utica Observer-Dispatch.
NYAPRS TRAINING – “TRANSFORMING MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES & SYSTEMS: WHAT DOES IT LOOK LIKE, HOW DO YOU GET THERE?”: MHANYS is proud to join many other organizations in partnering with the New York Association of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services (NYAPRS) to present a transformation seminar on September 21-22 at the Fallsview Hotel in Ellenville, NY. The seminar, titled, Transforming Mental Health Services & Systems: What Does It Look Like, How Do You Get There?, will provide middle management, direct care staff and peer leaders with the opportunity to hear from people on the front lines of the effort to transform “the system so that it will be both consumer and family centered and recovery-oriented.” Additional information is available at www.nyaprs.org/pages/view_enews.cfm?enewsid=4680 or by contacting Mary McLaughlin at marym@nyaprs.org or at (518) 436-0008 ext. 23.
MEDICARE PART D UPDATE: The NYS Office of Mental Health has developed a portion of their website dedicated specifically to Medicare Part D, which can be found at http://www.omh.state.ny.us/omhweb/MedicareD/index.htm. This website serves as an excellent resource, covering issues related to enrollment and disenrollment, issues specific to ‘dual eligibles,’ the low income subsidy, the drugs that will be covered, and other topics as well.
FAMILY ISSUES IN MENTAL HEALTH: The Capital District Psychiatric Center’s Family Advisory Committee presents a symposium on Family Issues in Mental Health on Thursday, September 15, 2005 at the CDPC Small Auditorium, 75 New Scotland Ave., Albany. Event is Open to the Public – No Charge. Featuring: Seating is limited, please register no later than September 7, 2005. Call Frank Greco, Director of Family Services at (518) 447-9611 ext. 4512.
MEDICARE RIGHTS CENTER PRESS RELEASE:
IN THE NEWS: More
Mental Health Care OK'd - State reverses earlier decision, will open spaces
for youths. By James T. Mulder After initially saying "No," the state has agreed to add more beds at Hutchings Psychiatric Center to stem the outflow of local youngsters forced to travel far from home for inpatient mental health care. Sharon Carpinello, New York's mental health commissioner, said Wednesday the state will add six beds at Hutchings and expand outpatient mental health services here for children and teenagers. Just last month, Carpinello told local elected officials in a letter the area didn't need more beds. She reversed her position in the wake of intense lobbying by local and state elected officials, hospital administrators, doctors and parents. About half the youngsters in Onondaga County who need inpatient psychiatric care are being hospitalized 50 to 150 miles away because there aren't enough beds here, according to county and hospital officials. During a visit to Syracuse Wednesday, Carpinello said she changed her position after taking another look at the issue with "a new lens." Last year's closing of Four Winds, a private mental hospital in Syracuse that had 64 beds for youths, created the local bed shortage. The closing left Syracuse with 16 psychiatric beds for youths at Hutchings. The state added eight temporary beds at Hutchings last year to help pick up the slack, but local officials said that wasn't enough. With the six additional beds, Hutchings now has 30 beds for children and teens. Carpinello said the state has been unfairly portrayed as being unresponsive to the issue. "I'm a very caring commissioner," Carpinello said. "One of my top agendas is children and adolescents." Onondaga County Executive Nick Pirro said he was pleased with Carpinello's decision, but isn't convinced the extra beds and services will be sufficient. "Our goal is to not have any Onondaga County children going out of the community," he said. Pirro said Carpinello flatly rejected the request for more beds at a June 21 meeting in Albany hosted by state Sen. John DeFrancisco, R-Syracuse. "We came out of that meeting and vowed we could continue making our case," Pirro said. Even though more beds are being added, Hutchings won't be able to admit every local child who needs to be hospitalized, Carpinello said. "Even if we added 50 or 100 beds, it doesn't mean at any point in time a single child would not have to go outside the community," she said. Demand for psychiatric beds for children and teens fluctuates on a seasonal basis, she said. Demand falls off in the summer and increases in the fall when school reopens. The extra beds will be made available when needed to meet seasonal spikes, she said. Syracuse's psychiatric emergency room at St. Joseph's Hospital Health Center has seen a higher than normal volume of adult patients in need of inpatient care this summer. Hutchings doesn't normally take adult patients directly from that emergency room because Hutchings is considered a long-term, not acute-care, mental hospital, Carpinello said. However, Hutchings did admit adult patients this summer from the psychiatric ER to ease the backlog, Carpinello said. Adding inpatient beds alone is not the answer for youths with psychiatric problems, she said. "I want to do everything that I can do promote and facilitate children being at home and in the community." To that end, the state will increase the capacity of the Home and Community Based Waiver program in Onondaga County so that it can serve 22 youngsters, an increase of six slots. Under this program, children at risk of hospitalization can get individualized care coordination, family support, respite care and many other services. "This kind of early intervention helps prevent kids from falling through the cracks," Carpinello said. The state also is adding a child psychiatrist at Hutchings who will consult with pediatricians in the area and answer their questions about medications and other issues.
Pataki
Rejects Bill Regulating Language of Public Documents. By Al Baker ALBANY, Aug. 19 - Striking a blow against a call for "politically correct" language in public documents, Gov. George E. Pataki vetoed a bill this week that would have switched the designation of "autistics" to "people with autism," among other changes for the ways to describe individuals with disabilities. In doing so, the three-term Republican governor rejected an idea backed overwhelmingly by Democrats and his fellow Republicans: the bill passed unanimously in the Republican-led State Senate in June and passed by a 144 to 1 tally in the Democrat-led Assembly. Some political observers in and out of Albany wondered if Mr. Pataki would have wielded his veto pen this way if he were seeking a fourth term as governor rather than exploring the possibility of a bid for the Republican presidential nomination, which means he must appeal to more conservative voters. "It seems to me a play to his potential conservative Republican electorate, come on," said Douglas Muzzio, a professor of political science at Baruch College. "It is not really politically correct language, it is appropriate language. "Political correctness," he added, "is seen to be the disease of liberals, that liberals are trying to spread through society, and conservatives see it as their duty to stamp it out and I guess Pataki is defining himself in that way." The bill sought to avoid derogatory or demeaning words that tend to cause an "invisible barrier," and perpetuate discrimination against those who are disabled, according to an Assembly memo outlining it. Language that identifies groups of people solely by their disability, such as "the mentally ill," or has negative overtones, such as "afflicted with cerebral palsy," would also be off limits. The bill would have applied to all new laws, papers published by the state and other kinds of public documents. Assemblyman Harvey Weisenberg, a Democrat from Long Island who sponsored the bill, said he wrote the bill, with help from parents of disabled children, to change everyday language, to lead to a shift in views of disabled people. "I mean, 'How is your retarded son?' What, are you kidding me?" said Mr. Weisenberg, who is the father of a 47-year-old son, Ricky, who is profoundly retarded, has cerebral palsy and is nonverbal. "I mean, that is the way people address people with disabilities. They see the disability and not the child, and the intent of my legislation is to see the children and not the disability." Mr. Pataki, who issued his veto on Tuesday and announced it on Friday, said he agreed that the language of public documents should be disrespectful neither to people with disabilities nor to groups of those people, who, he noted, "have historically been referred to with terms far worse than those identified" in the bill. "However," the governor wrote, "I cannot support legislation requiring politically correct speech, especially, when it establishes standards that are vague and subjective."
Law
aims to aid mentally ill seniors - Grant initiative that funds programs
begins next year. By Cara Matthews ALBANY -- As the ranks of senior citizens swell, a new state law aims to focus attention and money on a mental-health care system that has failed to meet their special needs. The number of adults 65 and older is expected to increase from 2.4 million to 3.7 million in the next 25 years, and double from 35 million to 70 million across the United States. In any given year, 20 percent of older adults have a diagnosable mental illness, said Michael Friedman, chairman of the Geriatric Mental Health Alliance in the state. "One of the things that's different about older adults is that they're much more likely to have chronic physical conditions as well as mental health conditions," he said. Many can't get to where services are provided, another difficulty they and the agencies that serve them face, he said. The Geriatric Mental Health Act, signed last week by Gov. George Pataki, will set up a grant program to fund innovative, community-based programs for the mentally ill elderly and set up an interagency geriatric mental health-planning council. Money for the grants would be included in next year's state budget. The law takes effect April 1, 2006. Sen. Nicholas Spano, R-Yonkers, and the bill's chief Senate sponsor, said the law is "enormously important, given the demographics that show us to have an aging population with many people, as they get older, who are suffering from some form of mental illness that very often is ignored or goes untreated." The target amount of funding to start is $3 million. But it is too soon to speculate on what may or may not be in the 2006-07 executive budget, said Scott Reif, a Budget Division spokesman. The rate of suicide is higher in the elderly population - particularly men older than 75 -- than any other age group, said Dr. Yeates Conwell, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Rochester School of Medicine. "These are treatable illnesses. Often people assume that getting depressed or confused is a normal consequence of aging," he said. Another challenge in serving mentally ill seniors is stigma, said Assemblywoman Donna Lupardo, D-Endwell, Broome County. Many senior citizens consider mental illness a character flaw, she said. "These are hidden illnesses. A lot of people will make excuses for mental health issues in the elderly," said Lupardo, an Assembly co-sponsor and former education director for the Mental Health Association of the Southern Tier. Lupardo described the legislation is a first step toward improving care and services. The state could use much more than $3 million to successfully meet the mental health needs of seniors, she said. The grants will be available to organizations that provide mental health, health and aging services. The interagency council the act creates is greatly needed because agencies often don't share successes or failures, or coordinate activities, Lupardo said. "You've got 15 different state agencies out there all basically with a piece of the pie," she said. Conwell said there are not enough venues where psychiatric services are well integrated with primary care. The legislation encourages innovation through partnering mental and physical health care, which could in turn reduce institutionalization and other costly care and improve quality of life, he said. In Monroe County, the university collaborates with agencies that serve the aging population to develop ways that health and human services can compliment each other, Conwell said. Groups and agencies that provide services to seniors with mental illness are well meaning, said Martha L. Bruce, professor of sociology in psychiatry in Weill Medical College of Cornell University, Westchester division.
New
Drug Plan Under Medicare to Get Ad Blitz. (excerpt) A new commercial airing nationally about the new Medicare prescription-drug benefit is one of the earliest indications of the publicity that will occur over the next several months as companies market drug coverage to older Americans. The drug benefit, which starts Jan. 1, is the biggest expansion in the history of Medicare. Beneficiaries who sign up for the coverage - it's not mandatory - typically will pay monthly premiums to the private companies that will design, sell and provide the drug insurance. Much of the current effort is targeted at reminding people to enroll; a big enrollment will help restrain premiums by spreading risk. |