Arizona Department of Health Services

/Tag:Arizona Department of Health Services

Final Medical Marijuana Rules Filed with the Secretary of State

By | April 22nd, 2011|General|

We filed our official rules for regulating medical marijuana with the Secretary of State last week.  The official rules include a few clarifications that weren’t in the set of unofficial rules that we posted on March 28.  The clarifications are reflected in the Arizona Medical Marijuana Rules, Medical Marijuana Act AZ Statutes and the Frequently [...]

Medical Marijuana Registration Website

By | April 14th, 2011|General|

We've had a lot of traffic on our Medical Marijuana Registration webpage today - some of you may have had some difficulty uploading photos or had a "session expired" message pop up.  Thanks to your help, we're working to resolve these bumps in the road.  If you have had problems this morning, you may want [...]

Adjusting Licensing to Accommodate Integration

By | April 13th, 2011|Licensing|

I’ve written often over the last few weeks about our priority over the next couple of years to better integrate primary healthcare and psychiatric care in AZ, and that last week HHS approved the Health Homes Planning Grant which will focus on improving coordination of care and increasing access to primary care and prevention services, [...]

Incentivizing Chronic Disease Self-Management

By | April 12th, 2011|Prevention|

This month AHCCCS told us that they’ve picked our Bureau of Tobacco & Chronic Disease as the state applicant for HHS’ Medicaid Incentives for Prevention of Chronic Diseases Grant.  The grant proposal (which will be developed with AHCCCS) must be turned in to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services early next month.  The grant [...]

MM Tribal Consultation

By | April 7th, 2011|General|

Michael Allison has set up a Tribal Consultation meeting regarding Medical Marijuana to get input and advice from our tribal partners on the new medical marijuana law.  There are a whole host of questions to consider, everything from whether any tribes intend to adopt the new law and whether they would ever be interested in [...]

Safety’s No Accident

By | April 6th, 2011|Prevention|

For some reason human nature drives us to fear unknown, strange, and seemingly unpredictable hazards more than the commonplace hazards that we face day to day, even though the everyday hazards are a far more important public health risk.  Accidents and injuries are a good example.  Accidents and injuries are hands-down the number 1 killer [...]

Comments Off on Safety’s No Accident

Health Homes Planning Grant Approved

By | April 5th, 2011|General|

Last week I wrote about how we and AHCCCS applied for a Health Homes Planning Grant from the US Dept. of Health & Human Services to improve the health status of folks with serious mental illnesses by improving case management, care coordination, health promotion, transitional care, individual and family support, referral to necessary services, and the [...]

Comments Off on Health Homes Planning Grant Approved

Open Letter to Arizona Physicians on Medical Marijuana

By | April 4th, 2011|General|

Laura Nelson, M.D.. Chief Medical Officer, Arizona Department of Health Services Will Humble, Director, Arizona Department of Health ServicesThank you for your interest in the effective implementation of the AZ Medical Marijuana Act.  We realize that many Arizona physicians may not yet feel comfortable with or fully informed about medicinal marijuana.  It is likely that [...]

Health Homes Planning Grant

By | March 31st, 2011|General|

Awhile back the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services released preliminary guidance to state Medicaid agencies (AHCCCS) regarding a new federal funding opportunity to coordinate and integrate primary, acute, behavioral health, and long term supports for folks with chronic illnesses.  The guidance encouraged state Medicaid agencies to work with partners to provide technical assistance for [...]

Comments Off on Health Homes Planning Grant

Want a dispensary? Think Rural

By | March 28th, 2011|General|

One of our objectives as we developed the final set of Rules for Medical Marijuana was to ensure reliable access to medication in rural Arizona.  That's why we built in some incentives to encourage folks to apply for one of the rural CHAAs.  First, we made sure that inventory could be transferred between dispensaries (and [...]