Contact: Lauren
Lempert
510-208-1740 (office)
llempert@iha.org
OAKLAND, Calif. January
25, 2007 -- The Integrated Healthcare Association (IHA) applauds Governor Arnold
Schwarzenegger’s leadership in proposing a health
reform plan that is bold, comprehensive, and thoughtful.
IHA is a not-for-profit statewide healthcare leadership group that
represents diverse interests and is composed of key California stakeholders
including health plans, physician groups, hospitals, and healthcare systems, in
addition to purchaser, pharmaceutical, technology, consumer, and academic
representatives. IHA is not just
one more special interest group; rather, it is an organization that is dedicated
to improving the performance and success of healthcare in California.
By engaging the various sectors of healthcare delivery in dialogue and
collective action, IHA seeks to promote breakthrough quality improvement in
healthcare for all Californians through innovation and collaboration.
IHA supports the plan’s
three central goals – prevention and health promotion, coverage for all
Californians, and affordability and cost containment – and acknowledges and
praises the efforts of the governor’s health policy team to engage the
numerous and varied California health care stakeholders in the process of
developing the proposal. IHA, which
represents many of these stakeholders, and has facilitated input with members of
the governor’s team to exchange information and ideas, was pleased to see that
a number of its objectives were incorporated in the governor’s proposal.
In particular, we appreciate that the proposal calls for partnering with
private and public sector purchasers to promote the measurement and reporting of
provider performance and the aggregation of data for quality improvement, pay
for performance, and consumer choice, and for reducing regulatory barriers to
more efficient health care delivery.
Additionally, the plan’s
aims to promote prevention, reduce obesity, encourage the adoption of health
information technology, and increase health care quality, efficiency, and
affordability are all consistent with IHA’s recommendations.
These goals are best achieved through the further development of
integrated healthcare, so IHA encourages the Governor’s policy team to
consider the importance of delivering health care through the established
physician groups in California who provide the coordinated care delivery system
capable of, and essential to, achieving the programs goals.
The goals of the Governors
proposal will best be achieved through a process of open and honest dialogue and
compromise. While individual IHA
stakeholders may have objections to and cannot endorse certain elements of the
plan and have legitimate concerns about the financing and long-term
sustainability of the plan, IHA as an organization remains committed to working
with the governor’s team to realize the plan’s fundamental aims.
We stand ready to continue the dialogue, stay actively involved, and help
the governor achieve his broad health care objectives.
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