Archive for category: News

Palm Beach Post (Florida)

October 24, 2024 Thursday

1 Edition

As both a husband and father, my greatest responsibility is to protect and support my family. As a member of the Florida House of Representatives, that responsibility extends to fighting for policies that ensure the safety, prosperity and freedom of all Floridians. I want my wife and daughter to have access to the highest quality health care, but with Florida’s growing restrictions on abortion, I’m deeply concerned – not only for their future but for the millions of women, girls and survivors of sexual assault whose health care options are being stripped away.

For the past eight years, I have seen the Republican majority chip away at women’s reproductive health care year after year. The 2023 Legislative session’s assault on women’s health was unlike any I have witnessed before in my eight years in the Florida House. At a historic pace, a 6-week abortion ban was discussed, voted on, passed, and signed into law.

Limitations on women’s health care are dangerous for women and put health care providers in impossible positions. In Florida, due to the six-week ban, we are witnessing a mass exodus of medical professionals, and practicing OB-GYN’s have indicated it is increasingly more challenging to practice safely and offer the level of care they want for their patients. Couple that with the governor’s office using public agencies to target individuals and organizations who are supporting Amendment 4 politically, it begs the question: Do medical professionals risk being targeted for providing abortions, even within the six-week time frame?

Health care decisions should be made between a woman and her doctor, not by politicians. Women should be able to trust their doctors to provide the best care possible, and girls should grow up knowing they have the right to make decisions about their own bodies.

Amendment 4, the Amendment to Limit Government Interference with Abortion, is our chance to stop this dangerous trend. The amendment states “no law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.” It will ensure that abortion is legal until viability, and stop government overreach into private medical decisions. I want every woman in Florida to have the peace of mind that comes with knowing they can get the care they need, when they need it, without interference from politicians.

Amendment 4 is about ensuring Florida’s health care system remains strong, our doctors can do their jobs without fear, and patients’ health is a priority.

The overwhelming majority of Floridians believe we should have the freedom to make our own personal health care decisions without interference from politicians. I’m proud to support Amendment 4, and I hope you’ll join me in voting to restore reproductive freedom in Florida. Please vote YES on Amendment 4.

David Silvers is a state representative for District 89, which includes parts of West Palm Beach, Lake Worth Beach, Greenacres, Cloud Lake, Glen Ridge, Lake Clarke Shores and Palm Springs.

Your Turn

David Silvers

Guest columnist

Palm Beach Post (Florida)

August 17, 2023 Thursday

1 Edition

Florida has experienced a significant increase in psychiatric crisis hospitalizations of children and teens in recent years, and an increase in those children being repeatedly hospitalized in the same year.

The 2024 legislative session will be my last before I term out of the Florida House, and I plan on continuing my quest to improve the mental health framework in our state. I plan on refiling legislation from the 2023 Legislative session that increases Medicaid requirements for managed care plan behavioral health performance for children.

The Florida Medicaid program has a significant role in behavioral health care because it insures a disproportionate share of the children are repeatedly hospitalized for behavioral health problems.

My first piece of legislation in 2017, House Bill 1183, focused on mental health for minors, particularly with regard to the Baker Act statute. The bill passed both chambers and was signed into law by then Gov. Scott. As a result of the legislation, a Baker Act Task Force was created to investigate the use of the Baker Act on minors with particular focus on children sent for medical evaluation by school authorities.

The task force met for six months after the bill was signed into law and provided a list of recommendations to the Legislature. I filed, passed, and had signed into law legislation from the 2019 session that implemented several recommendations provided by the Baker Act Task Force, House Bills 361 and 363. In the 2020 legislative session House Bill 945 passed, requiring the Department of Children and Families and the Agency for Healthcare Administration to identify children who are high users of crisis stabilization services and to meet behavioral health needs of such children. For the 2023 Legislative Session, I focused on mental health legislation by proposing, passing, and having signed into law House Bill 829, Operation and Administration of the Baker Act.

The Baker Act was groundbreaking when it first passed in the early 1970s because it created protections for individuals with mental illness while getting them treatment. The Baker Act allows individuals believed to have a mental illness and dangerous to oneself or others to be deprived of liberty so that they can be medically assessed and stabilized. It’s a complicated law, and it interacts with many other laws governing schools, nursing homes, and hospitals – places where individuals may be found in serious need of help.

House Bill 829 requires the Department of Children and Families to update and maintain key information resources that help the hundreds of thousands of law enforcement officers, school administrators, clinicians, facility directors, and others who implement the Baker Act to understand the law and act correctly. Doing so will preserve an individual’s liberty while ensuring those who truly need the treatment will get it.

Increasing Medicaid requirements for managed care plan behavioral health performance for children is my next priority.

The legislation is extremely important in addressing the shortfalls in our mental health care system, as it would require the Agency for Health Care Administration to establish network requirements for each type of behavioral health provider serving Medicaid enrollees and improve its testing of behavioral health provider networks.

State Rep. David Silvers is a Democrat who represents District 89 in Palm Beach County.

Your Turn

Rep. David Silvers

Guest columnist

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

June 6, 2022 Monday

1 Edition

When I was first elected to the Florida House of Representatives, in 2016, my initial goal was to become a champion for education reform, but after I was elected, I learned of the many mental health pitfalls awaiting so many children here in Florida. Nearly six years ago, during my first legislative session, I passed House Bill 1183, a comprehensive mental health reform focusing on children’s mental health, specifically on the Baker Act. HB 1183 established a Baker Act Task Force to meet monthly to investigate the proliferation of the use of the Baker Act, on minors, and put in place certain regulations that receiving facilities that admit minors must adhere to.

After HB 1183 passed, the Legislature and was signed into law by then-Gov. Rick Scott, I knew my work was only beginning with regard to mental health reform in our state. During the 2019 legislative session, I filed and passed House Bill 361 and House Bill 363, which implement several recommendations of the Baker Act Task Force. Both bills became law after being signed by Gov. DeSantis.

I have spearheaded mental health reform in the Legislature, and I don’t plan to stop. This past session, I expanded my focus beyond just the Baker Act in passing House Bill 255, which focuses on applied behavior analyses (ABA), an umbrella term referring to the principles and techniques used to assess, treat and prevent challenging behaviors while promoting new, desired behaviors. ABA has been recognized as a treatment option for a range of behavioral health conditions, with an emphasis on the treatment of autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

Autism spectrum disorder impacts the social, emotional and communication skills of affected individuals. The disorder includes a range of conditions that were previously diagnosed separately, such as autism, Asperger syndrome and other non-specific developmental disorders.

ABA has become widely accepted among health care professionals, is used in many schools and treatment clinics and is considered an evidence-based best practice treatment by the U.S. Surgeon General, American Psychological Association, American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and American Academy of Pediatrics.

Current law requires public K-12 schools to allow certified, licensed applied behavior analysts and mental health professionals to provide ABA services in a classroom setting. However, this requirement does not apply to behavior technicians working under the direction of these professionals.

Under HB 255, a registered behavior technician who holds a nationally recognized paraprofessional certification in behavior analysis, practices under the supervision of either a certified behavior analyst or licensed mental health professional, and who is employed by an enrolled Medicaid provider, must be allowed to provide ABA services in the classroom setting.

This bill is greatly needed so that children will have greater access to the mental health care they need and our education system will be relieved of some of the stress from the shortage of mental health professionals.

State Rep. David Silvers, D-Lake Clarke Shores, represents District 87, which includes parts of West Palm Beach, Lake Worth Beach, Palm Springs and Greenacres. He is running for re-election in 2022.

Palm Beach Post (Florida)

March 3, 2021 Wednesday

FINAL EDITION

If ever there was a time to modernize how we treat mental health and substance use treatment; the height of a global pandemic certainly seems like such a time.

It is a near-constant refrain that most of us believe that something — anything — must be done to improve how we address the very serious mental health issues in our state.

Here is one simple, yet effective policy change that can directly help people and change how we address our failing mental health system.

When patients are diagnosed with a mental health condition, too often they find that insurance fails to cover, or inadequately covers, treatment for that condition. In Florida, we know that the insurance policies we allow can severely limit access to mental health treatment, and the resulting gaps in coverage have the effect of making treatment too expensive. Note, these are people with full health insurance coverage, yet even they cannot get the coverage they need.

This must change.

A well-conceived federal law that has been in place for over a decade — pre-dating the Affordable Care Act — is supposed to ensure that mental health or substance abuse disorders are treated just like other health care services. It’s called “mental health parity.” But in our state, health insurers can functionally ignore the law.

I have introduced a bill (House Bill 959) to close the coverage gap loophole and put our state in alignment with federal law. If my bill passes and is signed into law by the governor, insurance companies would not be able to discriminate against patients who need mental health or substance use disorder treatment.

This is vital because, by at least one estimate, nearly half of those with health care policies reported that their plans limited the number of visits to a mental health professional, while no such limits were placed on traditional medical or surgical visits. Over half of them also reported that they were mandated to go out of network to receive basic mental health services — most often, to pay much higher out-of-pocket costs. Perhaps the saddest statistic of all, three in 10 were forced to get repeated authorizations at each stage of treatment for the same diagnosis and treatment plan — a violation of law for something like arthritis or diabetes.

Though a simple change, it won’t be easy to enact. Many people — including many medical professionals — simply do not see these disorders as being on the same plane as a treatment for a disease like cancer. The insurance lobby will sow fear about rising costs and the unknown impacts of the law.

The good news is that as other states have come into compliance, we now have data showing that closing this loophole and offering patients early treatment for mental health and substance use-related disorders can and will save both lives and money.

With a growing mental health crisis, this is the time to do something good, even if it is hard.

David Silvers (D) represents District 87, in central Palm Beach County, in the Florida Legislature.

Your Turn

David Silvers

Guest columnist