SF 531 – Data registry on pediatric congenital heart surgery
SF 563 – Pharmacy Benefit Manager’s annual report
HF 291 – Spouse’s protected income for Medicaid eligibility
HF 422 – Telehealth for CCUSO residents
HF 518 – Dually eligible Medicare and Medicaid members in nursing facilities
HF 570 – HCBS Brain Injury cap
HF 606 – Online continuing education for social workers, therapists and counselors
HF 623 – Eliminating prior authorization for certain substance abuse treatment
HF 625 – Integrating Medicaid and Hawki
HF 642 – Sharing of information in human trafficking cases
HF 644 – DHS to implement new federal Family First Act
HF 690 – Children’s Mental Health
HF 691 – MHDS regions fund balances
HF 731 – Mandatory reporter training requirements
SF 210 – Iowa CARE Act
SF 210 allows Iowans to designate a lay caregiver who will be given instructions to care for the patient upon discharge from a hospital. The CARE Act has four main features: (1) Designate – The name of the family caregiver is recorded when a loved one is admitted into a hospital, if a patient chooses to designate one; (2) Notify – The designated family caregiver is notified when the patient is to be discharged back home; (3) Consult – The hospital discusses the caregiver’s abilities and limitations; (4) Instruct – The hospital reviews the patient’s care needs at home, and provides an explanation and live instruction of the medical tasks to be performed.
[3/26: 49-0 (Excused: Breitbach)]
SF 531 – Data registry on pediatric congenital heart surgery
SF 531 requires a licensed hospital that provides pediatric congenital heart surgery to participate in a qualified clinical data registry and provide information on how to access the national information during educational consultations with parents.
[3/21: 46-0 (Excused: Bisignano, Celsi, R. Taylor)]
SF 563 – Pharmacy Benefit Manager’s annual report
SF 563 requires a Pharmacy Benefit Manager to submit an annual report to the Insurance Commissioner regarding fees, drug prices and rebates received by the Pharmacy Benefit Manager in the aggregate. The reporting requirement is applicable to plans issued in 2019.
[4/27: 49-0 (Excused: Guth)]
HF 291 – Spouse’s protected income for Medicaid eligibility
HF 291 raises the protected income that a spouse may retain when their partner is institutionalized from $24,000 to $25,284 to match federal law. Specific amounts are not spelled out in the bill, just the requirement to match federal regulations so new bills don’t have to be passed every time federal law changes.
[4/23: 49-0 (Excused: Petersen)]
HF 304 – Personal degradation
HF 304 is a technical change that allows dependent adult abuse “personal degradation” to be classified as “confirmed, not registered” to better match the severity of the crime. It expands current law that allows “confirmed, not registered” if the action is minor, isolated and unlikely to reoccur. Other allegations of dependent adult abuse that currently have the “confirmed, not registered” option are physical injury, unreasonable confinement, unreasonable punishment, assault and neglect of a dependent adult by a caretaker.
[4/18: 49-0 (Excused: Mathis)]
HF 422 – Telehealth for CCUSO residents
HF 422 allows the University of Iowa to provide health services for patients at the Civil Commitment Unit for Sexual Offenders (CCUSO) via telehealth when it is deemed medically necessary. This may save CCUSO some travel expenses if they don’t have to drive residents to Iowa City for treatment.
[4/25: 49-0 (Excused: Chapman)]
HF 423 – Medicaid for inmates
HF 423 provides that Medicaid coverage of an inmate of a public institution will be suspended, but not terminated, after the first 30 days of commitment, and that the suspension will continue during the entire period of the inmate’s commitment to the public institution. Previously, the law allowed the suspension to continue for up to the initial 12 months of an inmate’s period of commitment, at which time the inmate’s Medicaid coverage would be terminated.
[4/17: 50-0]
HF 518 – Dually eligible Medicare and Medicaid members in nursing facilities
HF 518 requires the Iowa Department of Human Services to seek approval from Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to allow the payment of nursing facility room and board expenses to be made directly to the nursing facility for a dually eligible Medicare and Medicaid member receiving the Medicare hospice benefit or a Medicaid-only member receiving hospice. Currently, the payments are made to hospice and passed along to the nursing facility. This bill is based on one of the options put forward by a 2018 interim work group.
[4/9: 48-0 (Excused: Bisignano, Feenstra)]
HF 532 – Medical residencies
HF 532 requires the Medical Residency Training state matching grants program and the awarding of primary care (including psychiatry) residencies by the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics (UIHC) to give priority to eligible applicants who are residents of Iowa, attended and earned an undergraduate degree from an Iowa college or university, or attended and earned a medical degree from a medical school in Iowa. The bill also directs the UIHC to allow Des Moines University fourth-year students to take elective classes at the Carver College of Medicine if space is available. The University of Iowa’s College of Medicine must conduct a study of the state’s workforce challenges in recruiting and retaining primary and specialty care physicians.
[4/16: 49-0 (Excused: Shipley)]
HF 570 – HCBS Brain Injury cap
HF 570 removes the monthly Medicaid cap for those on the brain injury home and community-based services (HCBS) waiver; and requires the Iowa Department of Human Services to track the average amount expended per waiver recipient each fiscal year and report the information annually to the Governor and Legislature by October 1.
[4/16: 49-0 (Excused: Shipley)]
HF 606 – Online continuing education for social workers, therapists and counselors
HF 606 prohibits the Board of Social Work from limiting the number of continuing education credits that social workers may obtain online and the Board of Behavioral Science from limiting the number of continuing education credits that marital and family therapists and mental health counselors may obtain online. It requires programs providing the continuing education credits online to comply with standards set by the appropriate board.
[4/16: 49-0 (Excused: Shipley)]
HF 623 – Eliminating prior authorization for certain substance abuse treatment
HF 623 removes prior authorization requirements in Medicaid fee-for-service and managed care for Medication Assisted Treatment (MAT) for substance use disorders when these medications are used: Methadone, Buprenorphine, Naloxone, Buprenorphine and Naloxone combination and Naltrexone.
[4/11: 49-0 (Excused: Brown)]
HF 625 – Integrating Medicaid and Hawki
HF 625 integrates Medicaid and Healthy and Well Kids in Iowa (Hawki) program eligibility, payment and administrative functions by eliminating the use of an administrative contractor under the Hawki program and transferring the duties of the administrative contractor to the Iowa Department of Human Services.
[4/22: 49-0 (Excused: Segebart)]
HF 642 – Sharing of information in human trafficking cases
HF 642 allows sharing of certain confidential information by the Iowa Department of Human Services to interdisciplinary teams. Currently, they can only share the information if the team is working on a child abuse investigation. This bill will allow information sharing in human trafficking cases when the interdisciplinary team’s sole focus is children in human trafficking cases.
[4/25: 49-0 (Excused: Chapman)]
HF 644 – DHS to implement new federal Family First Act
HF 644 allows the Department of Human Services (DHS) to implement the new federal Families First Prevention and Services Act (Family First Act). Under the bill, DHS must be more persistent in establishing and keeping foster care kids in their medical home and amends case plan requirements accordingly. It requires DHS to send “Proof of Foster Care” letters to youth to establish eligibility for Medicaid or educational assistance, etc. Promoting frequent visits between parents and children is required unless doing so would cause eminent risk to the child’s life or health. The Family First Act promotes practices to keep a child from entering foster care by using support systems within the family of origin. Standards regarding national background checks are elevated to anyone “working in a facility where children reside.”
[4/23: 49-0 (Excused: Petersen)]
HF 690 – Children’s Mental Health
HF 690 codifies that the Children’s State Board will provide oversight to the Children’s Mental Health System. It sets up the regional governance structure for the children’s system by adding members and advisory councils to the current Mental Health and Disability Services (MHDS) Regional governing boards. The MHDS regional boards must hire a children’s coordinator. Eligibility for services is defined, as well as core services. No new funding mechanism is established.
[4/16: 46-2 (No: Guth, Hogg; Excused: Dawson, Shipley)]
HF 691 – MHDS regions fund balances
HF 691 modifies the amount of excess funds counties can retain for cash flow for the adult Mental Health and Disability Services (MH/DS) system. Beginning in FY24, counties are limited to a fund balance reserved for cash flow of 40 percent of gross expenditures. Counties must reduce their levies by any dollar amount in excess of 40 percent beginning in FY24. If the bill takes effect on or after March 15, 2019, a county may recertify its budget as necessary to implement the provisions of the bill. In addition, MH/DS regions may amend a regional service system management plan or annual service and budget plan for FY19 and FY20. The bill strikes the current requirements of 20 or 25 percent cap on fund balances.
[4/17: 50-0]
HF 731 – Mandatory reporter training requirements
HF 731 is based on an interim workgroup’s recommendations regarding mandatory reporter training requirements. The training is for child abuse and dependent adult abuse. The frequency of the required refresher training is changed from every five years to every three years. The training is two hours unless retraining occurs before the third year and then it is one hour. The training is to be developed and provided by the Iowa Department of Human Services (previously many curriculums were developed by numerous groups and approved by the Iowa Department of Public Health). An employer may provide supplemental training specific to the person’s professional practice.
[4/17: 49-0 (Excused: Guth)]