December 4, 2025

Following are this week’s updates. If you have questions, please contact [email protected]. 

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ASCMI Form Development in SmartCare

CalMHSA is currently working on your behalf to implement the ASCMI form in SmartCare as a replacement for the current coordinated care consent form. Our estimate for this work is January 2026.

The state has worked hard to develop this consent form, which will benefit the people we serve. Our goal is to ensure SmartCare counties are in compliance with the new standard as early as possible.

We also plan to host a kick-off session led by privacy counsel from Manatt – who supported the state in designing the ASCMI form – so that your teams can ask any questions they may have. We’ll send information about that session as soon as it is scheduled.

In the meantime, if you have any questions, please reach out to [email protected] with questions.

Order Sig Displays Updated for Medications

On Dec. 8, SmartCare Medication Rx and Client Orders (for medications) users will notice a change in the order sig displays some of the medications/prescriptions. Streamline has improved for some medications’ order sig for clarity and standardization, and incorporated simplified terminology.

Users may also notice auto-dose and weight-dosing calculations available for some medications. Due to initial testing, two issues may have an impact:

1. Disabled free text sig: Many patient safety issues were encountered with this functionality for writing medication orders. We have asked Streamline to create a config key (EnableFreeTextSigPopup) to control this functionality, and it will be turned off. This will be primary driven.
2. As part of Streamline’s effort to improve the order sig, if a county has set up any medication in Order Set Up with defaults (e.g., dose, refill, day supply), then these values will be reset. In CalMHSA’s review of county data, very few counties were found to be using defaults, so this impact should be minimal.

CalMHSA requests that users double check their medication/prescriptions orders for accuracy given that this is a new build by Streamline. While CalMHSA has conducted extensive testing, we are still asking counties to be vigilant and report any concerns to the help desk.

Enhancements to Medication Consent Documentation and Reporting

We are pleased to announce new enhancements that improve how medication consents are documented and reported within the Psych Medical Note.

Documentation Options
Providers can now document medication consents using a combination of key phrases and checkboxes directly within the Psych Medical Note. To support more accurate tracking, new fields have been added that allow providers to:

Clearly indicate verbal consent has been obtained

View whether previous consent for the same medication has already been recorded. Please note that each time a new Psych Medical Note is created, the consent checkbox will reset and be available for use again.

For additional information, see How to Document Medication Consents – Psych Medical Note Template 

New CalMHSA 116 – Medication Consent Report

To support oversight and reporting needs, the CalMHSA 116 Medication Consent Report has been introduced. This report displays all verbal medication consents documented through the Psych Medical Note template, making it easier for staff to review consent history across client records. The report includes the medication name, date consent was obtained, and the provider that recorded the consent. More details: CalMHSA 116 – Medication Consent From Psych Medical Note Template

Upcoming CalMHSA Connex Maintenance

All Connex users were sent an email notification about upcoming maintenance to the Connex site on Dec. 7 from 7 a.m. – 7 p.m. Please plan accordingly for this maintenance window and contact [email protected] with any questions.

New Alerts for Duplicative Medication Orders

Streamline has released a configuration key — ‘ShowAlertForDuplicateMedicationOrdersInRxAndClientOrders’ — that will show alerts if there are duplicative medication orders with overlapping dates in both Medication Rx and Client Orders.

Currently, the alerts are for exact medication names (e.g., two orders with the medication name of ‘Acetaminophen’). Please note: You will NOT receive an alert if there is a generic with a brand name (e.g.,Tylenol and acetaminophen), NOR if the same active ingredients (acetaminophen and Norco). Streamline plans to incorporate a larger set of alerts in the future.