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    • What We Want --- SAMHSA Grant Opportunities Due Jan. 22, 2019
    • Anti-Social Personality Disorder >
      • DECONSTRUCTING ANTISOCIAL PERSONALITY DISORDER AND PSYCHOPATHY: A GUIDELINES-BASED APPROACH TO PREJUDICIAL PSYCHIATRIC LABELS [Hofstra Law Review 2013]
      • Personality Disorders -- Unscientific & Vague -- Must Be Reformed
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      • Job Accommodation Network on Executive Functioning Deficits
    • Medicaid & Medicare Network Adequacy >
      • OIG: STATE STANDARDS FOR ACCESS TO CARE IN MEDICAID MANAGED CARE (Sept. 2014)
      • OIG: ACCESS TO CARE: PROVIDER AVAILABILITY IN MEDICAID MANAGED CARE (Dec. 2014)
      • GAO 15-710: MEDICARE ADVANTAGE: Actions Needed to Enhance CMS Oversight of Provider Network Adequacy (Aug. 2015)
      • CMS: Promoting Access in Medicaid and CHIP Managed Care: A Toolkit for Ensuring Provider Network Adequacy and Service Availability (April 2017)
    • Medicaid Mental Health & Substance Use Disorder Parity >
      • CMS Parity Compliance Toolkit Applying Mental Health and Substance Use Disorder Parity Requirements to Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Programs [Jan. 17, 2017]
      • Frequently Asked Questions: Mental Health and Substance Use Disorder Parity Final Rule for Medicaid and CHIP [CMS October 11, 2017]
    • Olmstead Disability Rights >
      • Statement of the Department of Justice on Enforcement of the Integration Mandate of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Olmstead v. L.C. (2011)
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      • the Logical Long Term Consequences of our failure to provide Intensive Community MH Treatment
      • Olmstead Nation ---State Pages: How Far to Comply with Olmstead?
  • Take A Walk Around Orchid's Resource Block
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  • Mental Health By The Numbers
  • New Science Is Amazing AND It Has HUGE Moral Implications for Our Society: NOW
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  • " 'Defund the Police" Means 'Invest in the Resources Our Communities Need' " or Don't Cost Shift to the Police
  • VAGUE OLMSTEAD PLANS, EXPENSIVE LITIGATION
  • Updating & Reforming our Understanding & Treatment of "Anti-Social Personality Disorder" Blog
  • Reform of " Anti-Social Personality Disorder" in Criminal Justice
  • CO HB22-1278
  • New Understandings Matter
  • Mental Health, Ethics & Law
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  • Inflammation, the Immune System, Neuro-Developmental Disorders, Psychiatric Disorders, Substance Use Issues & Chronic Disease
  • Microglia and the Brain's Immune System
  • Substance Issues & the Immune System

Simplicity on the Near Side of Complexity --- PRISON BUDGETS

1/15/2023

 
Polis' $1 Billion State Prison Budget Isn't the Answer Anymore than A NARROW VIEW of "DE-INSTITUTIONALIZATION" was "THE ANSWER" for Mental Health
Olmstead is about preventing the "UNNECESSARY INSTITUTIONALIZATION" of people with Disabilities.

If we don't have any sense of a CONTINUUM --- you can end up where the DISABILITY COMMUNITY was 10 years ago --
  • We want people out of the Mental Institutes and
  • There are very few people with disabilities in the Criminal Justice System.

In the span of a DECADE --- that has CHANGED IN A BIG WAY.

Now most disability advocates would say the primary INSTITUTIONS for people with "MENTAL ILLNESS" are JAILS & PRISONS.

Picture
Our go to expert is often Former Director of the National Institute of Mental Health Thomas Insel who says Psychiatric Disorders are some of the most complicated problems in Medicine.
Picture
RAISING THE COMPLEXITY ANTE IN CRIMINAL JUSTICE
  • One of the other things that happened in the last decade was --- we started to realize how many people with BRAIN INJURY are in the Criminal Justice System
  • Statistics on BRAIN INJURY in CRIMINAL JUSTICE often run higher than PSYCHIATRIC DISORDERS --

RAISING THE COMPLEXITY ANTE  EXPONENTIALLY in CRIMINAL JUSTICE
  • Developmental Disability (sometimes with IQ under 70, often with an IQ over 70),
  • Psychiatric Disorders
  • Brain Injury, and 
  • Substance Issues

Well -- that sounds really complicated --- BUT these are often DISTINCT ISSUES that are well understood and we have great treatments for:
  • NOT SO MUCH
  • These are often BLURRED
  • Our TREATMENTS can be Medications that affect the BRAIN GLOBALLY --- and the precision medicine that's needed isn't there.
Picture
New Yorker:  A New Hemingway Documentary Peeks Behind the Myth
One of the things that I appreciated about Ken Burns and Lynn Novick's documentary on Hemingway was Burns & Novick showed all the COMPLEXITY of Hemingway who was a talented guy AND who was often a NUT CASE ---He had mental illness, brain injury, substance issues (and I would say probably developmental issues)
Picture
Complex Patterns
Not an insignificant percentage of people in the Criminal Justice System are dealing with MULTIPLE COGNITIVE ISSUES.

So we're often dealing with the MOST COMPLEX ISSUES in MEDICINE in MULTIPLE in COMPLEX PATTERNS ---
If we want to use $1 Billion Dollars to further the transition to a PUBLIC HEALTH APPROACH TO CRIMINAL JUSTICE  --- that is probably not a bad thingBUT trying to placate a frustrated PUBLIC with more stuff that doesn't work isn't the way to go.
Picture
Jerry Lewis Telethon for Muscular Dystrophy
A lot of DISABILITY ADVOCACY is what to do when you DON'T HAVE THE "CURE"  ---It's often an EXPLICIT REJECTION of the Jerry Lewis Telethon approach to DISABILITY ADVOCACY.
Picture
CNN:  The AIDS activists of the past have more to teach us (2021)
Having said that --- AIDS ACTIVISTS did understand the importance of SCIENCE to their CAUSE and spent a lot of time ADVOCATING at the FEDERAL RESEARCH LEVEL.
When it comes to people with disabilities in the Criminal Justice System:
  • We need a Comprehensive Continuum of Care, and
    • To me that is the States, Medicaid & HUD -- and we get rid of the well-intentioned Medicaid Institute of Mental Disease Exclusionary Rule that is making it hard for States to fund that Continuum of Care at higher levels of need.
Picture
UCHealth -- the picture is associated with a story on Covid --- but the University of Colorado and others are doing important work on PSYCHO-NEURO-IMMUNOLOGY
We need BETTER TREATMENTS ---
  • In a PBS Special funded by the American Psychiatric Foundation --- there was an acknowledgment that BETTER TREATMENTS are needed.
  • Research is probably primarily a FEDERAL ISSUE although Colorado has leading researchers and we should be CAPITALIZING on that to the MAXIMUM EXTENT POSSIBLE.

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  • Home
    • About Orchid >
      • Why Orchid?
      • ORCHID'S SYSTEMIC FOCUS & "ROOT CAUSE" ANALYSIS APPROACH TO PROBLEM SOLVING WITH A COMMITMENT TO CREATIVITY & INNOVATION
      • Disclaimers, Limitations and An Invitation
      • Orchid Board
      • Orchid Book Club
      • Conjecture, Science & Translational Research & Medicine
      • Orchid Themes & Symbols
      • The Tipping Point
      • Orchid's Website Advertising Policy
      • Statement for Potential Website Contributors
      • Contact
  • Blogs
    • Val's Blog
    • Val's Blog 2
    • ​TRANSLATIONAL/ ​TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE MONDAY
    • NEURO-DIVERSITY Wednesday
    • Olmstead Law & Order Thursday
    • Translational Medicine Friday
    • Translational Love, Relationships & Neuro-Diversity Saturday
  • Orchid's A-Z Index
    • Crisis Services in CO, the US & Around the World
    • Assertive Community Treatment & Flexible ACT Index
    • Housing & Homelessness Index
    • Criminal Justice
    • Innovation Index
    • For More: See the Main Orchid Index Page
  • US Federal
    • THE IMD RULE & ADMIN. ENFORCEMENT OF DISABILITY CIVIL RIGHTS LAWS
    • Medicaid & Supportive Housing & Housing-Related Services
    • CMS' FAILURE TO COVER HOUSING FOR LTC & THE IMD RULE: WHAT THEY HAVE IN COMMON IS DISCRIMINATION
    • National Take
  • Research & Translational Medicine
    • Immunology & Mental Health >
      • Alcoholism & the Immune System & Mental Health
      • Brain Injury, the Immune System & Mental Health
      • Celiac Disease & Sensitivities, the Immune System & Mental Illness
      • Mental Illness & The Immune System
      • Racial Discrimination & the Immune System & Mental Health
      • Trauma & the Immune System & Mental Health
      • ***Physical Health Issues, the Immune System & Mental Health Index
    • University of Chicago: Institute of Translational Medicine
  • Hot Topics
    • What We Want --- SAMHSA Grant Opportunities Due Jan. 22, 2019
    • Anti-Social Personality Disorder >
      • DECONSTRUCTING ANTISOCIAL PERSONALITY DISORDER AND PSYCHOPATHY: A GUIDELINES-BASED APPROACH TO PREJUDICIAL PSYCHIATRIC LABELS [Hofstra Law Review 2013]
      • Personality Disorders -- Unscientific & Vague -- Must Be Reformed
    • Executive Functioning & "Prison Brain" >
      • Job Accommodation Network on Executive Functioning Deficits
    • Medicaid & Medicare Network Adequacy >
      • OIG: STATE STANDARDS FOR ACCESS TO CARE IN MEDICAID MANAGED CARE (Sept. 2014)
      • OIG: ACCESS TO CARE: PROVIDER AVAILABILITY IN MEDICAID MANAGED CARE (Dec. 2014)
      • GAO 15-710: MEDICARE ADVANTAGE: Actions Needed to Enhance CMS Oversight of Provider Network Adequacy (Aug. 2015)
      • CMS: Promoting Access in Medicaid and CHIP Managed Care: A Toolkit for Ensuring Provider Network Adequacy and Service Availability (April 2017)
    • Medicaid Mental Health & Substance Use Disorder Parity >
      • CMS Parity Compliance Toolkit Applying Mental Health and Substance Use Disorder Parity Requirements to Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Programs [Jan. 17, 2017]
      • Frequently Asked Questions: Mental Health and Substance Use Disorder Parity Final Rule for Medicaid and CHIP [CMS October 11, 2017]
    • Olmstead Disability Rights >
      • Statement of the Department of Justice on Enforcement of the Integration Mandate of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Olmstead v. L.C. (2011)
      • Comprehensive Olmstead Planning
      • the Logical Long Term Consequences of our failure to provide Intensive Community MH Treatment
      • Olmstead Nation ---State Pages: How Far to Comply with Olmstead?
  • Take A Walk Around Orchid's Resource Block
  • Colorado Abuse & Neglect Scandals Involving People with Disabilities
  • Mental Health By The Numbers
  • New Science Is Amazing AND It Has HUGE Moral Implications for Our Society: NOW
  • Olmstead & Homelessness
  • Double V
  • " 'Defund the Police" Means 'Invest in the Resources Our Communities Need' " or Don't Cost Shift to the Police
  • VAGUE OLMSTEAD PLANS, EXPENSIVE LITIGATION
  • Updating & Reforming our Understanding & Treatment of "Anti-Social Personality Disorder" Blog
  • Reform of " Anti-Social Personality Disorder" in Criminal Justice
  • CO HB22-1278
  • New Understandings Matter
  • Mental Health, Ethics & Law
  • CO Olmstead Disability Homeless Law & Policy Project
  • Inflammation, the Immune System, Neuro-Developmental Disorders, Psychiatric Disorders, Substance Use Issues & Chronic Disease
  • Microglia and the Brain's Immune System
  • Substance Issues & the Immune System