On March 19, 2012, Sen. Evie Hudak and Rep. Jim Kerr introduced SB 12-159 – Concerning the Evaluation of Home- and Community-Based Services for Children with Autism Under the Medicaid Waiver Program. This summary is published here courtesy of the Colorado Bar Association’s e-Legislative Report.

The bill clarifies that evaluation of children receiving long-term care services and supports through the Medicaid autism waiver program must occur at the time the child begins receiving services and when services terminate, as well as regularly during the course of services. The evaluations must include norm-referenced and standardized assessment of the child’s expressive and receptive communication, the child’s adaptive skills, including self-help skills, and the child’s maladaptive behavior, including self-injurious and aggressive behavior.

The department of health care policy and financing shall annually review the balance in the Colorado autism treatment fund to determine whether additional eligible children may receive services and supports under the program.

As part of its regular review of Medicaid waivers, the department shall review the waiver to determine if the program eligibility criteria are sufficient to ensure that services and supports under the program are being directed toward children with significant intellectual or adaptive impairment in addition to a diagnosis of autism.

The department shall conduct an evaluation of the program and the children served through the program that must include information about the improvement in communication and adaptive behavior of children receiving services and supports. The department may contract with an independent program evaluator to review individual treatment evaluations.

The bill clarifies that moneys in the fund may be used for the evaluation of children receiving services through the program, as well as for the evaluation of the program.

The bill is scheduled in the Health And Human Services Committee on April 4 Upon Adjournment.

Summaries of other featured bills can be found here.