TLC provides residential and specialty mental health treatment services to youth in foster care. This facility offers a variety of mental health treatment and residential program services to youth who are Medi-Cal beneficiaries. The proposed agreement will allow for the availability of services for youth with specific residential treatment needs, and their families when considered appropriate for these services.
Youth who are placed in out-of-home care by Health and Human Services Agency (HHSA), Probation, or voluntarily placed by their parents through the Adoption Assistance Program, are eligible for Medi-Cal. Medically necessary Medi-Cal mental health services for eligible children are considered an entitlement. As part of its Managed Care Plan for specialty mental health services, the HHSA is responsible for determining the medical necessity of services for each beneficiary, obtaining access to necessary services, authorizing, and paying for these services.
The services provided by TLC include mental health services designed to reduce serious behaviors and symptoms resulting from a mental illness that can require acute psychiatric hospitalization, and the need for a highly structured and supervised placement. The goal of placement in these facilities is to improve the youth’s functioning such that the youth can move to a lower level of care within 6 months or as determined by the Child and Family Team (CFT). Progress in treatment for youth is evaluated through reports on the frequency of at risk behaviors as well as tracking of progress toward treatment goals.
This agreement is retroactive due to the new statewide Continuum of Care Reform and Assembly Bill 403 which impacts regulations for group homes that are converting to Short Term Residential Therapeutic Programs (STRTP).