APPROVED CHAPTER
JUNE 14, 2021 191
BY GOVERNOR PUBLIC LAW
STATE OF MAINE
_____
IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD
TWO THOUSAND TWENTY-ONE
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H.P. 84 - L.D. 118
An Act To Address Maine's Shortage of Behavioral Health Services for
Minors
Be it enacted by the People of the State of Maine as follows:
Sec. 1. 34-B MRSA §15003, sub-§9, as amended by PL 2019, c. 343, Pt. DDD,
§7, is further amended to read:
9. Reports. The department shall report by August January 1st of each year to the
joint standing committee of the Legislature having jurisdiction over health and human
services matters on the following matters:
A. The operation of the program, including fiscal status of the accounts and funds from
all sources, including blended, pooled and flexible funding, related to children's mental
health care in the departments; numbers of children and families served and their
residences by county; numbers of children transferred to care in this State and the types
of care to which they were transferred; any waiting lists; delays in delivering services;
the progress of the departments department in developing new resources implementing
improvement strategies; and appeals procedures requested, held and decided;,
including the results of decided appeals and audits; and evaluations done on the
program;
B. The experiences of the departments in coordinating program administration and
care delivery, including, but not limited to, progress on management information
systems; uniform application forms, procedures and assessment tools; case
coordination and case management; the use of pooled and blended funding; and
initiatives Initiatives in acquiring and using federal and state funds grant funding; and
C. Barriers to improved delivery of care to children and their families and the progress
of the departments department in overcoming those barriers.; and
D. The number of children served by crisis providers and the number of children who
waited for the appropriate level of behavioral health treatment in a hospital emergency
room during the preceding year. The department shall make a reasonable effort to
obtain information from providers, including implementing a standardized system for
the reporting of data. Data collected pursuant to this paragraph must protect the
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 confidentiality of all persons involved to the same extent as otherwise required by state
or federal law or rule.
Sec. 2. 34-B MRSA §15003, sub-§10, as amended by PL 2019, c. 343, Pt. DDD,
§8, is repealed.
Sec. 3. Standardized data. The Department of Health and Human Services shall
work with hospitals to develop a consistent and reliable system of data definitions and data
collection to identify the number of children with behavioral needs who remain in hospital
emergency rooms after they no longer need a medical hospital level of care pursuant to the
Maine Revised Statutes, Title 34-B, section 15003, subsection 9, paragraph D. The data
must include the length of stay of a child in hospital beyond 48 hours after the child no
longer needs a hospital level of care and the reasons for the extended stay, including, but
not limited to, the lack of an appropriate hospital or residential bed or lack of community
services. In the department’s annual report due to the Legislature pursuant to Title 34-B,
section 15003, subsection 9, for January 1, 2022, the annual report must include a
description of the progress in developing standardized data pursuant to this section.
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Statutes affected:
Bill Text ACTPUB , Chapter 191: 34-B.15003