State of Montana Gets $1.5 Million Medicaid ?Transformation? Grant

The Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services (DPHHS) has received a $1.5 million federal grant to improve the efficiency and quality of its Medicaid program.

The purpose of the “transformation” grant is to fund innovative ways to provide health-care coverage for vulnerable, low-income residents. About 120,000 people receive Medicaid each year in Montana, many of them children.

The U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services awarded a total of $103 million to Montana and 26 other states.

DPHHS plans to use its grant to enhance the way it maintains electronic health records. The department will expand the capacity of its secure Web-based system to house information about the overall health status of each Medicaid recipient, as monitored against published national disease guidelines.

“With this grant, we’ll be able to address the goal of providing our Medicaid providers with information related to the health status of each Medicaid client,” said John Chappuis, state Medicaid director. “Not only will providers be better able to manage their patients’ health, but the state will be able to get a better handle on containing health-care costs.”

He noted that the new system will also allow Medicaid clients to access their own health information so they can more actively and readily manage their health-care needs.

No state matching money is required for the grant project.