The National Academy for State Health Policy (NASHP) is pleased to announce that the following 16 states will be attending a State Respite Summit in Washington, DC on February 6–7, 2024: Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.

The Summit will convene state teams interested in improving access to high quality respite services for beneficiaries and their family caregivers. These teams will discuss key issues with experts, exchange strategies and insights with their peers, and have a dialogue with federal officials who are working to improve access to respite care.  The Summit agenda will include the following:

• The first day will bring the 16 state teams together to engage in peer-to-peer learning — along with expert discussants — on innovative models, strategies, and policies to increase access to high quality respite care services.
• The second day will be a conversation between state and federal officials. Through this conversation, state participants will learn about federal resources that could support their efforts to improve the delivery of respite care — and federal participants will obtain insights about how states are leveraging the resources they offer and ideas for increasing their effectiveness.

Sessions will align with the 2022 National Strategy to Support Family Caregivers to support its implementation. Topics will include:

• Awareness and outreach to ensure care recipients and their family caregivers know what respite services are available to them
• Caregiver access to respite services that are culturally and medically appropriate
• Capacity building for the direct care workforce, paid and unpaid, to deliver respite care
• Medicaid payment policies to increase the availability of respite services