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News Release
California Supports to National Initiative for Better Health at Lower Cost15.4 million Californians will benefit The State of California today joined the nationwide initiative on value-driven health care, joining major private employers who have expressed support since the effort was launched by HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt in November. California joins a growing list of states that have committed to the initiative since Secretary Leavitt’s appeal to public sector employers Nov. 28. “Aggressive efforts are underway to invite all of America’s public and private sector employers to join the federal government in supporting the four cornerstone actions to achieve better health care and lower health costs,” Secretary Leavitt said. “Employers can help their employees identify and select high quality health care at competitive prices. When a substantial number of employers commit to these improvements, our health care system as a whole will improve for all Americans.” Secretary Leavitt made these remarks as California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed an executive order requesting CALPERS to encourage and enable the four cornerstone actions in the health insurance it provides state employees. Earlier in the week, more than 60 California employers in Mountain View and Los Angeles pledged to support the initiative. More than 15.4 million will benefit by implementation of the initiative in California. The four “cornerstone” actions are: public reporting of the quality of care delivered by health care providers; public reporting of the price of care; commitment to health information technology standards; and commitment to use incentives for high quality care, competitive costs and consumer choice. "I am committed to improving the quality, transparency and accountability of health care in our state, and this executive order is a step forward in our work to fix California's broken health care system," said Governor Schwarzenegger. "This order directs my administration to bring in the best minds from the public and private sectors to develop a market-based strategy to achieve our goals and reduce costs." "I am proud that Governor Schwarzenegger and leading California employers are choosing to support these four cornerstones to achieve better health care and better value for employees and their families," Secretary Leavitt said. "Until now, it has not been possible for patients to learn in advance about the quality of care they can expect to receive from a provider, or the cost of the services they will incur. By making this information available, employers can help their employees get better care and better value in health care.” The federal government was the first to embrace the four cornerstone commitments, with President Bush’s Aug. 22 Executive Order. This action committed federal health programs to the four cornerstone actions. “With commitment to the cornerstones on behalf of a major percentage of insured Americans, we will reach a tipping point that will bring about meaningful measurement and reporting of quality of care, usable cost reporting, and real choice for consumers based on this quality and cost information,” Secretary Leavitt said. A key part of the initiative for value-driven health care is the adoption of consistent and reliable standards for quality and cost measurement to enable consumers, health providers and payers alike to compare the quality and value of services. Secretary Leavitt said that the initiative depends on collaboration between stakeholders in the employer, health care provider and insurer communities. He also noted that development of quality measures is being carried out with the leadership of the nation’s leading health care provider organizations. “Patients will come to expect quality and performance information about health care providers,” Secretary Leavitt said. “They will expect to have price or cost information in advance to make good value decisions about their care. They will use this information to improve health care value for themselves and their families and the choices they make will help improve value and health care quality across the health care sector.” California Cooperative Healthcare Reporting Initiative, a nonprofit arm of the Pacific Business Group on Health, was recognized earlier in the day as a pilot site to provide better quality information (BQI) to improve care for Medicare beneficiaries. There are six collaboratives in the country that have been chosen as pilots to pioneer new methods of reporting on quality of care, especially through the use of Medicare data. The techniques proven by these pilot sites will be used by other collaboratives in the future as we build a national network of organizations for providing information to help compare the performance and costs of health care providers. “Six organizations have been chosen to lead the way as we develop a national network for public reporting, and I’m proud to officially designate the California Cooperative Healthcare Reporting Initiative as one of these,” Secretary Leavitt said. “Their work will help pioneer a new era of public reporting and improved value for health care providers.” More information on Value-Driven Health Care is available at www.hhs.gov/transparency. For a full list of companies that have signed statements of support, including those signing in California today, visit: http://www.hhs.gov/transparency/employers/statements.html.
### Note: All HHS press releases, fact sheets and other press materials are available at http://www.hhs.gov/news. Last revised: March 15, 2007 |
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