Leadership Health Care Gets D.C. Reform Update

KELLY PRICE

Leadership Health Care Gets D.C. Reform Update | healthcare reform, Wyden-Bennett Healthy Americans Act, Nancy-Ann DeParle, Congress, Ron Wyden, Bo Bartholomew, Leon Dowling, Caroline Young, Leadership Health Care Council

U.S. Senator Bill Frist, M.D., Rwandan Ambassador James Kimonyo, Vonne Jacobs (Bass, Berry & Sims) and Bo Bartholomew (PharmMD) at Leadership Health Care's Delegation to D.C.

Local Delegation Visits with Key Players in Debate

Washington D.C. is a world unto itself.

Visitors often require assistance from knowledgeable local guides to understand the ins and outs and ups and downs of the constantly changing political and public policy scene.

During the Seventh Annual LHC Delegation to Washington, D.C. on March 11-12, members of Nashville's Leadership Health Care Council visited with some of the town's key insiders for a view of the way the legislative and executive branches work, particularly in the area of healthcare reform.

Members of the delegation, made up of 70 local healthcare executives, had an opportunity to hear from the national leaders who are helping shape policies and prospects for the major reform of this country's healthcare system universally acknowledged to be on the horizon.

In a two-day agenda packed with breakfasts, lunches, speeches, trade group panel discussions and dinners with lawmakers and policy wonks, the Nashville group got insights, opinions, and proposals from national leaders and heard from Tennessee's own congressional members, including Representatives Jim Cooper and Marsha Blackburn and Senators Bob Corker and Lamar Alexander.

U.S. Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), co-sponsor of the Wyden-Bennett Healthy Americans Act, spoke to the group about progress on the bill, which has been vetted by the Congressional Budget Office on Taxation and won bi-partisan support, but faces a still uncertain future as it makes its way through Congress.

Leon Dowling, president and CEO of IMI Health, said, "One of the highlights of the recent delegation to Washington was hearing about Wyden's universal healthcare plan, which would replace the current employer-based health insurance system with a system in which the government requires, subsidizes, and oversees a system of private healthcare plans that individuals select. The coverage is guaranteed to be as good as that which federal employees receive, and the government subsidizes healthcare for people up to 400 percent of poverty level. The plan is funded by changes to the tax code, including a tax on employers of between 3 percent and 26 percent."

Dowling added that "access to speakers and information through Leadership Healthcare is invaluable."

Nancy-Ann DeParle, Counselor to the President and Director of the White House Office of Health Reform, spent almost an hour with the group answering questions and explaining her new position as "Health Care Czar."

Bo Bartholomew, president and CEO of PharmMD and vice chair of LHC, commented after the meeting that he "couldn't think of a better person for President Obama to have appointed to this position. She is clearly someone who understands the complexities of healthcare in this country." DeParle, a UT and Harvard graduate as well as a Rhodes Scholar, has extensive roots in the Tennessee healthcare arena.

Bartholomew said that, during the group's private meeting in the Capitol to discuss her new role, DeParle explained that she "had not been given a specific road map but a lot of freedom to come up with what the nation's healthcare system should be." Bartholomew said he feels that the fact that DeParle will have "a chance to get in front of any forthcoming legislation" will be very helpful, and he was pleased she seemed very willing to hear from experts in Nashville.

"She really wants Nashville to be part of the healthcare reform dialogue," Bartholomew stated.

Other high-power officials who met with the delegation included Neera Tanden, Department of Health & Human Services; Julie Barnes, New America Foundation; Ed Howard, Alliance for Health Reform; Jeff Cohen, Federation of American Hospitals; Kristin Welsh, American Hospital Association; Paul Keckley, Deloitte Center for Health Solutions; Lindy Hinman, America's Health Insurance Plans; Laura Miller, eHealth Collaborative; policy advisors for several ranking senators involved in healthcare reform; and former U. S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, MD, a partner with Cressey & Company.

Caroline Young, president of the Nashville Health Care Council, said, "The annual delegation to Washington showcases the expertise found within Nashville's healthcare industry for the policy leaders who are making critical decisions about healthcare in the United States."

She added, "The delegation offered a unique interaction with the individuals leading our nation's healthcare reform discussions. High-caliber officials from the White House, HHS, Congress and industry joined together for a series of engaging discussions about the issues impacting Nashville's largest economic engine.

"For Nashville, this delegation has come to symbolize the influential role the city's healthcare industry, with combined revenue of more than $50 billion, plays at the national level," she continued.

Bass, Berry & Sims; Bradley Arant Boult Cummings; Deloitte; and Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis sponsored the 2009 local delegation.

LHC was formed by the Health Care Council in 2002 to foster the next generation of healthcare leaders by creating educational, mentoring and networking opportunities for the organizations' nearly 400 members representing diverse sectors of Nashville's healthcare industry and professional support services.