Appendix C: Social Service Acronyms

AMI — Alliance for the Mentally Ill of Minnesota

Arc— Formerly known as the Association of Retarded Citizens, an advocacy organization for persons with developmental disabilities.

BI — Brain Injured. An individual whose deficits in adaptive behavior or substantial functional limitations are caused by injury to the brain resulting in tissue damage and affecting functional abilities.

CAC — Community Alternative Care. CAC is a home and community care program which pays for health care services in the home of an individual who requires the level of care of a hospital. This is a medical assistance program approved by the federal HCFA.

CADI — Community Alternatives for Disabled Individuals. CADI is a home and community care program which pays for health care services in the home of an individual who requires the level of care of a nursing facility. This is a medical assistance program approved by the federal HCFA.

CD — Chemical Dependency

CDCS — Consumer-Directed Community Supports. An approved service under the Developmental Disabilities Waiver Program that gives consumers or their families more control over the funds used to buy various support services.

CHCO — Children Home Care Option

CMV — Current Market Value

CSG — Consumer Support Grant. A program that awards cash grants to adults with disabilities or families who have children with disabilities. Grants may be used to obtain various support services.

CSMD — Community Supports for Minnesotans with Disabilities, MN Department of Human Services.

CSSA — Community Social Services Act (Minnesota Statutes, Section 256e). This Act establishes a system of planning for and provision of community and social services administered by boards of county commissioners in each county of the state under the supervision of the Commissioner of Human Services.

DD — Developmental Disability. Persons diagnosed with mental retardation or a related condition who have substantial functional limitations or deficits in adaptive behavior and who manifest these conditions before their 21st birthday.

DHS — Department of Human Services

DSM-III-R — Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Third Edition-Revised - American Psychiatrist's Association official manual of mental disorders. Manual contains glossary of descriptions of the diagnostic categories.

DT & H — Day Training and Habilitation Centers. Nonprofit organizations that provide employment and habilitative services for persons with developmental disabilities.

EGA — Emergency General Assistance

FFP — Federal Financial Participation. Federal monies, matched by state and local monies, which are used to provide for maintenance service needs of eligible individuals. For example, federal monies available through Title XX of the Social Service Act to be used in payment for social services.

FSG — Family Support Grant. A program which awards cash grants to families who have children under 22 who are at risk of out-of-home placement. Grants can be used for a variety of purposes if they are part of an approved plan.

GA — General Assistance. State program which provides financial assistance to eligible people who are unable to provide for themselves and dependents. Individuals must meet established criteria of eligibility.

GA-EA — General Assistance-Emergency Assistance (also know as EGA). Monies provided to eligible persons in crisis situations which receiving EGA will resolve, provided that the individual is unable to resolve the crisis situation on their own without EGA and that the situation will result in severe hardship for the individual if not solved. Must be a bonafide emergency.

GAMC — General Assistance Medical Care. State-funded health care coverage program for individuals who are either General Assistance recipients or who do not meet the categorical requirements of medical assistance whose financial situation prevents them from affording necessary health care. Typically these are adults under age 65 who are not disabled and are not caring for children.

GRH — Group Residential Housing. A state-funded income supplement program that pays for room and board costs for low income persons who have been placed in a licensed or registered setting with which a county human service agency has negotiated a monthly rate.

HCBW — Home and Community Based Medicaid Waivers. Waivers to regular medical assistance program which are authorized by state law and approved by federal Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), which allows reimbursement of services not usually covered by Medical Assistance (MA), but will help an individual get the services they need in the community and keep them out of an institution. Includes day program, habilitation services, supported employment program, respite care, SILS, adaptive equipment, and several other services.

ICF/MR — Intermediate Care Facility for the Mentally Retarded. Facility certified by State Department of Health to provide health or rehabilitative services for mentally retarded individuals or persons with related conditions who require active treatment.

IEP — Individual Education Plan

IPP — Individual Program Plan. A detailed plan developed by a county case manager for a person who has mental retardation or a related condition. This includes assessments, diagnosis, needed services, and annual and long-term goals for the client.

MA — Medical Assistance (also known as Medicaid or Title XIX of the Social Security Act)

MA-EPD — Employed Persons with Disabilities. MA buy-in option for people with disabilities who are employed.

MA-ID — Medical Assistance Identification Card. ID card mailed by Department of Human Services to an eligible individual to show health care providers that the individual is a Medical Assistance recipient and to provide billing information to the providers.

MCHA — Minnesota Comprehensive Health Association. A state operated insurance program for people who otherwise are unable to obtain insurance.

MDH — Minnesota Department of Health

MHA — Mental Health Association (of Minnesota)

MNCARE — MinnesotaCare

MR/RC — Mental Retardation or a Related Condition - See DD.

MSA — Minnesota Supplemental Aid. State program which provides financial assistance to elderly, disabled, and blind recipients of Supplemental Security Income (SSI).

NF — Nursing Facility. An institution, certified by the State Department of Health to provide skilled nursing care.

PCA — Personal Care Assistant/Attendant

PDN — Private Duty Nursing

PMAP — Prepaid Medical Assistance Program

QA — Quality Assurance

QI or CQI — Quality Improvement or Continuous Quality Improvement. Service design that uses continuous feedback to improve effectiveness and/or efficiency.

QMB — Qualified Medicare Beneficiary. An individual who is entitled to Medicare Part A, whose income is below 100% of the federal poverty guideline, and whose assets are below two times the SSI asset limit. This is a medical assistance (MA) category of eligibility which entitles the QMB to MA coverage of Medicare cost-sharing.

RSDI — Retirement, Survivors, Disability Insurance (Social Security or OASDI.)

RSS — Regional Services Specialist. An expert in the area of developmental disabilities, who authorizes home and community-based services under the case managers in-service provision, and acts as a liaison between the county and the state in a given area of the state.

RTC — Regional Treatment Center. A state operated institutional facility providing 24-hour a day care and treatment for persons diagnosed as mentally retarded, mentally ill, or chemically dependent. Formerly known as state hospitals.

SEP — Supported Employment Program. A program to assist a developmentally disabled (DD) person to keep a job with support from a program which includes a job coach, social workers, and staff knowledgeable in working with individuals with DD.

SILS — Semi-Independent Living Services. A residential program for developmentally disabled adults in which they can live semi-independently, such as in an apartment with a roommate, with follow along services to help the client live as independently as possible.

SMRT — State Medical Review Team. Determines disability status using Social Security Administration criteria.

SOCS — State Operated Community Services. Community ICFs/MR facilities with six or fewer beds that are operated by the Department of Human Services.

SSA — Social Security Administration

SSI — Supplemental Security Income. Federal program which provides a monthly grant to qualified aged, blind, and disabled individuals under Title XVI of the Social Security Act to help pay their living expenses.

TBI — Traumatic Brain Injury

TDD — Telephone Device for the Deaf

TEFRA — Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1962. Federal Public Law 97-248. This term is also commonly used to describe the optional medical assistance (MA) category of eligibility enacted under TEFRA Subs. 134 for children with disabilities who require a level of care of an institutional setting and who, if they lived in an institution, would be MA eligible but for whom care at home is less expensive for the MA program.

TITLE XIV — SSI (Supplemental Security Income). The federal cash program for persons who are aged, blind, or have disabilities.

TITLE XIX — Medicaid

TITLE XX — Federal Social Services Program

Source: Minnesota Department of Human Services, February 2000.

Return to Table of Contents / Appendix B / Appendix D

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A Guidebook on Consumer Controlled Housing for Minnesotans with Developmental Disabilities, a joint publication of Arc Minnesota and the Research and Training Center on Community Living, Institute on Community Integration (UAP), University of Minnesota.