Arnold v. Sarn Service Capacity Increases on Target
Service capacity increases mandated by the Arnold v. Sarn lawsuit are on target. The exit agreement on the suit stipulates an increase of services for folks living with a serious mental illness in Maricopa County during fiscal years 2015-2016. Mercy Maricopa Integrated Care (the regional behavioral health authority for Maricopa County) is on target in providing the service capacity increases. [...]
ADHS Awards New Behavioral Health Services Contracts
The mind and body aren’t separated - and neither should the healthcare delivery system - especially for folks with a serious mental illness. People with a serious mental illness die more than 25 years earlier than the general population…an unacceptable health disparity in anybody’s book. The increased mortality is largely from treatable medical conditions caused by modifiable risk factors like [...]
Arizona Aces Latest CDC Public Health Preparedness Report Card
Every year the CDC evaluates each of the states on their public health preparedness performance. Arizona continued to score high marks on this year’s preparedness report card. We got a perfect score this year for biological laboratory testing, and we’ve kept our excellent performance measures for incident management, medical countermeasures, and public information. Our response times for activating our emergency [...]
What’s a CON, Anyway?
Arizona uses a Certificate of Necessity (CON) system to regulate ground ambulance service in Arizona - and to make sure that every place in the State has adequate emergency medical services, including the frontier parts of Arizona. The CON actually describes the geographic service area, level of service (advanced life support or basic life support), hours of operation, response times, [...]
The Certificate of Necessity (CON) “Pipeline”
American Medical Response’s (AMR) isn’t the only application in the pipeline. A number of fire departments along with private groups are applying for CONs right now. Some are farther along in the application process than others. Why all the interest in running an ambulance company? Rural Metro’s bankruptcy has probably played a role along with the Affordable Care Act. Also, [...]
Flu Season May Be a Hard One
We expect to see flu cases, hospitalizations, and even some deaths every year, but recent data from the CDC shows that this season may be a little different than the past few flu seasons. First, the flu strain causing the most cases so far this year is Influenza A (H3N2). Flu seasons in which H3 subtypes are more common tend [...]