National Health Care Experts Identify Payment Reform as Key to Improving Quality, Efficiency

Friday, January 26, 2007

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Reforming the current payment structures to reward quality and value will drive significant improvement in the U.S. health care system, according to the consensus statement of more than 30 health care policy experts who gathered this week at Harvard University for a health policy forum on improving productivity. The forum is part of the Mayo Clinic Health Policy Center's long-term, nationwide initiative to shape the future of health care by uniting many voices into one.

"The expertise that each participant brought to the process was crucial," says Robert Smoldt, chief administrative officer of Mayo Clinic and the leader of its policy center. "Spirited debate and compromise allowed us to arrive at some strong recommendations for change. We all agree that patients are not currently well-served by a fragmented delivery system that consumes tremendous resources and produces less-than-optimal results."

After a day and a half of debate, participants arrived at several action principles:

• Develop a definition of value based on measurable outcomes, safety and service, compared to the cost over time.
  
• Pay providers based on value, with a methodology for allocating finite resources.
  
• Create competition around outcomes through pricing and quality transparency.
  
• Hold all sectors in health care accountable for reducing waste and inefficiencies.
  
• Create a trusted mechanism to synthesize scientific and clinical information in an impartial and rigorous way for both consumers and providers.
  
• Encourage formation of integrated systems to deliver effective and appropriate care.

Participants representing many sectors — providers, health plans, employers, patient advocacy and academia — contributed to the formation of the action principles. (See attached list.)

"The nation should take up the challenge to transform the health care system now," says Jerome Grossman, M.D., director of the Kennedy School Health Care Delivery Policy Program and co-host of the forum. "Costs can be cut, the number of uninsured can be reduced, and more Americans can have access to the quality care they deserve and that we are capable of delivering."

For more information about the Mayo Clinic Health Policy Center and its initiatives, visit www.mayoclinic.org/healthpolicycenter.

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