June 12, 2025
Following are this week’s updates. If you have questions, please contact ehr@calmhsa.org.
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Finalize Safety/Crisis Plans Ahead of Change on June 20
Last month, CalMHSA updated counties about plans to change the active screen for the safety/crisis plan. Changes were set to occur on May 23, but per some counties’ requests, the change has been paused until June 20.
At that time, counties will see two options for the safety/crisis plan document in SmartCare. Please make sure any plans are finalized (signed) before June 20. We will be deactivating the document at that time.
New Inquiry Locking Functionality
On June 4, CalMHSA held a county shared decision-making meeting around new inquiry functionality. We covered the ability to now lock inquiries, as well as how this impacts the Client Information screen. A new protocol detailing this functionality has been published, as well as the discussion around offering scripts to address historical inquiries that won’t be automatically included in the new functionality.
Configuration Change Activates Workflow for Enrollment Request
CalMHSA has made a scheduled configuration change to turn on the workflow that allows users to quickly and easily create an enrollment request for a client in a program. This included changing the configuration key “TurnOnCareCoordinationWorkflow” to “Yes” and adding recode values to the recode category “EnableProgramOnDispositionControl” so that the program-related fields would be available.
Because this update was communicated in advance with no negative response from counties, the change was made the evening of Friday, June 6.
Part of the workflow includes using the Disposition field. Whenever a disposition is selected, a user MUST select an Assigned Staff OR an Assigned Workgroup. These are currently required fields, even though no “to-do” items will be assigned to that person. Users can simply enter themselves as the assigned staff.
There is an exception for dispositions considered “end-points” that do not require an assigned staff or workgroup. CalMHSA has added the appropriate recodes for “CareCoordinationEndingDisposition,” which should not require that you enter an assigned staff or workgroup for “Individual Refused,” “Information Only,” and “Never Returned” dispositions. This change occurred on June 10.
If your county does not want to use this functionality, the configuration key “TurnOnCareCoordinationWorkflow” can be changed to “No.” Please note that, while this will remove the requirement to add an Assigned Staff/Workgroup, it will also remove the ability to put the client in requested status in the program.
We received a report that at least one county has been unable to add an end date to a recode; we continue to work on this issue. Setting the configuration key “TurnOnCareCoordinationWorkflow” to “No” will make these recodes unnecessary, so even if there is not an end date, the workflow won’t push the information to the Program Assignments for that client.
Please feel free to reach out to ehr@calmhsa.org with any questions about this change.
Upcoming Deployment of 2024-25 Procedure Rates to Production
CalMHSA will be deploying the updated 2024–25 procedure rates to production environments on the morning of Tuesday, June 17. Details of the procedure rate changes can be found in the May 22 EHR Bulletin. Any county that would prefer to delay the update in their production environment can contact lisa.kirlin@calmhsa.org or khristy.stephan@calmhsa.org by Friday, June 13.
Help Desk Holidays June 19 and July 4
Please note that CalMHSA and the Help Desk will be closed June 19 for the Juneteenth holiday, as well as for the July 4 holiday next month.
2025 TADT Submission Protocol Published
CalMHSA has published a protocol regarding the 2025 TADT submission. To date, questions about the TADT have not received responses from DHCS, and with the upcoming submission deadline of July 1, we have decided to issue guidance without that clarification. The protocol will be updated as feedback from DHCS is received.
Due to the types of changes and the deadline, we recommend counties run the current CalMHSA TADT Report as is, which will require minimal manual manipulation.
Due to the extensive changes in the State Plan reporting requirements, CalMHSA will be merging the State Plan and DMC-ODS reporting documents. CalMHSA deployed a DMC-State Plan timeliness record document on April 14, after the reporting period. This means that if a county was using the DMC-ODS reporting documents, the data gathered should be fine as-is. We will schedule a county shared decision-making meeting within the next few weeks to discuss the planned changes to TADT documents mentioned in the protocol and previously discussed with counties.
We will also be planning on deactivating the County Holiday screen, as this was used to determine what dates were considered business days. Now that we have learned that DHCS requires counties to use the DHCS holidays for the timeliness calculations, we will be updating the holidays annually based on the DHCS designated holidays. Counties will no longer need to enter their own holidays and CalMHSA wants to ensure that only the DHCS holidays are used for timeliness calculations. CalMHSA will therefore deactivate the County Holidays (Administration) screen on 7/1/25 and reset all dates to match the DHCS holiday calendar.
Addressing Validations on the Inquiry Details Screen
Counties continue to report issues with certain validations on the Inquiry Details screen. While troubleshooting, CalMHSA has discovered that these validations are not currently included in the primary sync, so the changes made to resolve issues have not been pushed to county environments.
The most expedient solution for counties is to deactivate validations on the Inquiry Details screen — see directions in this new knowledge base article: How to Address Validations on the Inquiry Details Screen, which lives on the System Administration Documentation page under “Inquiry Administration.”
CalMHSA is aware that many of the validations will appear “active,” even though they don’t seem to be in practice. We are working with Streamline to clarify the logic of these validations and their active status in the system.
The two validations that counties seem to be experiencing are the following; CalMHSA recommends deactivating both:
- Initial – Client Information (Potential) – Gender is required
- Initial – Referral Resource – Organization Name or First Name/Last Name is required
Upcoming Initiatives
See the EHR Product Team’s upcoming initiatives in this list, updated as products and priorities evolve.
06.12.25-County-and-State-Requested-EHR-Initiative-Report.pdf