Cathy Levine, Leader, Ohio Campaign for Better Care
Each day, health care advocates like me struggle to bring the voices of people who have encountered health care problems to the policymakers who make the decisions that affect our care and our lives. Earlier this month, some of those policymakers came to us in Cincinnati to hear what we had to say. It was a useful gathering that included patients, hospital administrators, doctors, nurses, advocates and policymakers – a gathering I hope will be repeated throughout our state and country.
The 100-odd participants had a serious conversation about how important it is to include patients in discussions about improving care.
We were honored to host Dr. Don Berwick, Administrator and Dr. Paul McGann, Deputy Chief Medical Officer, of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). (CMS is the federal agency responsible for Medicare, Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program, which together provide care to nearly one in three Americans). Our roundtable was sponsored by the Ohio Campaign for Better Care and the national Campaign for Better Care and held at Xavier University.
Drs. Berwick and McGann gave an update on the Partnership for Patients: Better Care, Lower Costs initiative, an unprecedented private/public partnership designed to improve the quality, safety and affordability of health care by reducing medical errors, improving care coordination and lowering the number of unnecessary hospital readmissions.
We’ve been working hard in Ohio to ask our hospitals to sign onto the Partnership, and to include patients and families in efforts to improve quality and safety. At the event, we were proud to announce that Christ Hospital was signing the Partnership for Patients pledge. Now all Cincinnati area hospitals are on-board with this new policy, which makes me very proud.
When our local hospitals establish real partnerships with patients, people like Gloria Smith will benefit. A Cincinnati cancer survivor, Gloria shared her powerful personal story with Drs. Berwick and McGann at the event. Despite a long history with cancer, Gloria was left with a damaged, raspy voice because doctors were slow to diagnose her cancer of the larynx, and she had to be her own persistent advocate to get a diagnosis at all.
Dr. Berwick was moved by her experience, and hit the nail on the head when he said: “The only way we can get American health care where it needs to go in our nation is with a shared agenda, mutual understanding, and real solid communication between the people who benefit from care – and ought to – and the people who give care and want to meet their needs.”
Joining me and Dr. Berwick on the panel were committed advocates and providers, each of whom is breaking ground in patient-centered care. They were: Christine Bechtel, a leader from the national Campaign for Better Care; Karen Meyers, Attorney-Advocate-Adjunct and Past Chair of the Family Advisory Council at Christ Hospital; Colleen O’Toole, President of the Greater Cincinnati Health Council; Laura Trice, Medical Director of TriHealth Seniors’ Health: SeniorLink and GEROS Medical Group; Ken Wilson, Director of Program Operations for the Council on Aging of Southwestern Ohio; Norm Wernet, State Director-Field Coordinator, Ohio Alliance for Retired Americans; and Robert Harris, Peer Support Coordinator, The Center for Independent Living Options, Inc.
They and the people they represent demonstrate the great potential for the Campaign for Better Care to succeed in ensuring that a reformed health care system provides the comprehensive, coordinated, patient- and family-centered care that older adults and individuals with multiple health problems need. This event built new relationships between providers and patients and we look forward to working closely with the Greater Cincinnati Health Council and the Health Improvement Collaborative of Greater Cincinnati, the leaders in local efforts to improve health care safety and quality, to increase patient involvement in the work.
We know that billions of precious health care dollars are wasted every year in this country on poor quality care that makes patients sicker instead of better. And we know that, now more than ever, with Medicare and Medicaid on the chopping block, we must spend our health care dollars more wisely. If we improve the quality and coordination of care, and refuse to pay for poor quality care, we can avoid the kind of irresponsible cuts that leave our oldest and sickest patients – patients like Gloria Smith – to fend for themselves.
That’s what we are pressing for here in Ohio. I am very glad that the federal leaders took the time to hear about our work and that the local health care community wants to work with the Ohio Campaign for Better Care to expand the patient and family voice in improving care.
Cathy Levine, JD, is Executive Director of UHCAN Ohio and leader of the Ohio Campaign for Better Care.
