News

The governor's budget plan, which lays out state funding of Medicaid services, proposes to cut payments to hospital-based clinics by an estimated $150 million over two years when federal matching funds are included. This cut threatens an important source of services that are not readily available to Medicaid patients elsewhere, potentially leaving these vulnerable populations without meaningful access to community-based primary and specialty care.... Read More >>

Navos CEO David Johnson testified in Washington, D.C., in front of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee about the ways the Affordable Care Act has benefitted those with behavioral health needs in our state, and about the potential damage of scaling back the Medicaid expansion and policies of the ACA.... Read More >>

Friday, February 24 was the cutoff for the bills to be voted out of the House Appropriations and Senate Ways & Means committees. All the bills that are still alive now move to their full house of origin for consideration and possible amendment, and the deadline for bills to pass through their house of origin is Wednesday, March 8.... Read More >>

The recent Washington State Supreme Court ruling in Volk v DeMeerleer abandoned the longtime standard for when a provider has a duty to warn potential victims and law enforcement of a dangerous patient's inclination to cause harm. The previous standard required a warning be made when there was an actual threat of physical violence against an identifiable victim or victims. ... Read More >>

Friday was the cutoff for the bills to be voted out of the House Appropriations and Senate Ways & Means committees. All the bills that are still alive now move to their full house of origin for consideration and possible amendment, and the deadline for bills to pass through their house of origin is Wednesday, March 8. In other words, in order to be alive after March 8, a bill that started in the House committees must pass a floor vote of the House and vice versa in the Senate. ... Read More >>

HB 1337, the physician licensure compact bill, passed the House with a vote of 94 to 3. SB 5436 passed the Senate 49-0. The bill makes the definition of "home" more flexible in the state's telemedicine law. ... Read More >>

House Republican leaders released on February 17 a proposal to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The proposal — the most detailed to date of how the ACA would be replaced — outlines broad policy changes but lacks enough detail to for us to fully understand how Washington State’s patients, hospitals and health systems will be affected. However, the significant reductions in federal Medicaid funds would have a major impact on our state and erode the coverage gains achieved under the ACA.... Read More >>

The Health Care Authority (HCA) published additional guidance for providers still working toward participating in the HCA’s Link4Health Clinical Data Repository (CDR). This guidance comes after the February 1 first implementation date for providers to share electronic health record (EHR) Medicaid patient data via the CDR.... Read More >>

Friday was cutoff for bills to be voted out of their original policy committees in Olympia. To make it easy, we’ve listed all of the major bills we’ve been tracking.... Read More >>

It was an exciting week leading up to Friday’s cutoff for bills to be voted out of their original policy committee. To make it easy, we’ve listed all of the major bills we’ve been tracking. This is just a partial list; WSHA/AWPHD staff have reviewed more than 300 bills thus far.... Read More >>