July 16, 2026
Following are this week’s updates. If you have questions, please contact [email protected].
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Upcoming Update to Contract Provider Charge Export
The Contract Provider Charge Export is being updated with the addition of Mode of Delivery, This will deploy to production on July 20.
Important Note: Beginning July 20, the new Invoice Generators will be required to continue invoicing. Counties may begin using the new Invoice Generators now with the current version of the Contract Provider Charge Export in Production.
Homelessness Tracking Added to Special Populations
CalMHSA has added the BHSA homelessness tracking special populations to the SUD special populations list. This update allows SUD staff to document BHSA homelessness tracking information in SmartCare while ensuring mental health staff cannot view a client’s enrollment in SUD programs. This change was deployed to Production on July 14.
Travel and Documentation Time Tracking Update
CalMHSA has continued to test the travel and documentation time validations, including group note testing, and updates have now been deployed to all county QA environments. Counties are requested to complete testing to help confirm there are no outstanding issues.
If issues are encountered during testing, please submit a ticket to the Help Desk with as much detail as possible so the team can investigate and troubleshoot appropriately.
CalMHSA will continue QA testing alongside counties. If no significant issues are identified, the update is planned for deployment to production on Aug 3.
Please note: The original target deployment date of July 1 was established to support fiscal year reporting and was not a DHCS compliance requirement. The additional testing time is intended to ensure a stable production release.
CalMHSA Release of Information Document Available for County QA
To provide greater stability and county-driven control, CalMHSA has developed a new Release of Information (ROI) document. As a CalMHSA-managed document, all future updates will be reviewed, designed, and approved by CalMHSA, helping ensure changes align with county needs.
The new ROI has been designed using county feedback and guidance from legal counsel. It is now available in county QA systems for testing. CalMHSA is also integrating the document with existing SmartCare ROI functionality so that completed forms will appear in the ROI Log on the Client Information screen and support the existing Revoke ROI functionality. (Previously, updates to the document were limited because the current ROI is a core document maintained by Streamline.
Important Testing Note
Due to a current SmartCare system limitation, the ROI is considered “signed” once the staff author signs the document. At that point, it will appear on the Client Information Release of Information Log, even if the client or guardian has not yet signed.
During testing and future use:
- Wait to sign the ROI until the client or guardian is ready to sign
- Review existing ROI records before disclosing confidential information
ASCMI Completion Report: Signature Type Added
CalMHSA has updated the ASCMI Completion Report (CalMHSA 121) to include the method client’s signature method (signature or verbal). This enhancement will help counties monitor ASCMI implementation and identify instances where the verbal signature option has been used.
Reminder: Verbal consent is not a valid client signature method for the ASCMI Form. For more information, please refer to the knowledge base article.
C-SSRS Permission Update
CalMHSA has corrected an issue with some C-SSRS documents not being permissioned to the appropriate user roles. Additional C-SSRS documents have been added to clinical user roles (LPHA/clinician and Non-LPHA), as well as medical records and system administrator roles (Medical Records/Quality Assurance, County Affiliate SysAdmin, and CalMHSA SysAdmin).
Please note that the “C-SSRS Adult Screener” document is a custom document that was not requested by CalMHSA. CalMHSA recommends that counties switch to the C-SSRS Adult Screeners document, which is a Streamline core document that will continue to be updated in future MSP deployments.
After making the switch, counties will need to deactivate the custom document in their systems. After all counties have completed this transition, CalMHSA will deactivate the custom document in CalMHSA production as well.
In the meantime, write permissions to all C-SSRS documents will remain available.
Upcoming Initiatives
See the EHR Product Team’s upcoming initiatives in this list, updated as products and priorities evolve.
CalMHSA EHR Initiative Report 7-16-26.
Events Calendar
To register for events, visit the events page.