Committee backs one-time Medicaid-funded EMR purchase and other changes to correctional health system

Representative Eliason presented House Bill 39, Correctional Health Amendments, to the Senate Health and Human Services Committee on Feb. 28. The committee favorably recommended substitute 3 by voice vote; the motion passed 5–0.

Eliason said the bill grew out of interim committee visits to the new state correctional facility and from an effort to implement the justice-reinvestment (1115) Medicaid waiver that allows the state to bill Medicaid for services up to 90 days prior to release. He said a functional electronic medical record (EMR) is necessary to bill Medicaid and to perform the discharge planning envisioned by the waiver, and the substitute authorizes up to $10,000,000 from a restricted Medicaid account for a one-time EMR purchase.

"We lea…