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Enhancing Lives, Ensuring Accountability: The Value of Florida’s Behavioral Health Managing Entities

Cost Savings, Health Care, Research

Florida’s Behavioral Health Managing Entities (BHMEs) are at the heart of an innovative, community-based network delivering critical mental health and substance use services across the state. This report’s summary reveals how BHMEs efficiently coordinate a vast network of providers with minimal overhead—ensuring accessible, continuous care for vulnerable populations—while highlighting the risk that stagnant operational funding poses to their long-term sustainability. It ultimately recommends boosting operational funding from 3% to 5% to maintain the system’s effectiveness and guide future policy decisions.

Social Determinants of Health: Economic Stability

Economic Development, Institute of Quality Health and Aging, Research, Social Determinants of Health

This report, the fifth installment in Florida TaxWatch’s five-part Social Determinants of Health series, examines how economic stability—steady employment, adequate income, food security, and housing stability—affects health outcomes. It highlights the health disparities faced by low-income families and advocates for policies promoting job access, affordable housing, and proper nutrition to improve public health across Florida.

Social Determinants of Health: Social and Community Context

Institute of Quality Health and Aging, Research, Social Determinants of Health

This research examines how social relationships and community dynamics profoundly influence individual health outcomes. The report reveals critical insights into the complex interactions between social support, community engagement, and personal well-being

Social Determinants of Health: Education Access and Quality

Education, Institute of Quality Health and Aging, Research, Social Determinants of Health

The Florida TaxWatch Institute on Quality Health and Aging presents its latest report on the connection between education and health outcomes. This study, part of a series on Social Determinants of Health, reveals how higher education levels correlate with better health, longer lifespans, and reduced healthcare costs. The report explores the economic impact of education on public health and state budgets, emphasizing the importance of early childhood education. It offers valuable insights for policymakers, healthcare professionals, and educators, aiming to guide policies that improve health outcomes and economic prosperity for all Floridians. Download the full report to learn how investing in education can significantly impact Florida’s public health and economic future.

Aging in Place—The Economic and Fiscal Value of Home and Community-Based Services

Health Care, Research

Similar to demographic trends across the U.S., Florida will encounter a rapid increase in the number of elderly residents requiring long-term care and services. Florida’s 65 and older population is anticipated to grow by 52.1 percent over the next two decades from 4.4 to 6.7 million elderly residents. A variety of continuum of care options exists to accommodate the impending rise in long-term healthcare utilization, ranging from nursing homes to home and community-based settings. Not only do these options differ in their public costs and quality outcomes, but the COVID-19 pandemic has spotlighted the importance of physical risk and exposure to infection when considering what long-term settings exist. Due to the projected growth in Florida’s elderly population over the coming decades, it will be critical to expand resources across the state’s entire continuum of care.

Comments to the Honorable Colleen Burton, Chair, and Members of the House Health and Human Services Committee Regarding HB 17: Telehealth Practice Standards

Releases

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the opportunity- and the need- to make telehealth as accessible as practicable. Telehealth helps reach audiences that may otherwise be unable to access care and provides the opportunity to improve patient care, treatment, education, and services, and ultimately bend the cost curve.

Comments to the Honorable Manny Diaz, Jr., Chair, and Members of the Senate Committee on Health Policy Regarding SB 700 – Telehealth

Releases

Since 2014, Florida TaxWatch has researched and supported the expansion of telehealth (see Critical Connections to Care and Telehealth in Florida: Where We Are and What is Next) and our work has consistently found that telemedicine provides a way for Florida to increase self-sufficiency, contain costs, and improve health care access and outcomes. 

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