“We don’t have health care in America − we have sick care,” said Lt. Governor Dewhurst during a press conference with Senator Jane Nelson as they introduced Senate Bills 7 and 8 − legislation designed to increase health care savings for the State of Texas, create more flexibility for providers, enhance transparency for the public, and improve medical outcomes for patients.
Nelson and Dewhurst referred to SB 7 and SB 8 as free market approaches that incentivize health care providers and hospitals to focus on best practices, wellness and healthy patient outcomes. SB 7 focuses more on Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), while SB 8 is geared toward the overall Texas health care system. Collectively, the bills are thought to be able to save the state 1/3 of its health-related costs, primarily in primary and acute care. The Legislative Budget Board (LBB) is currently estimating what the long-term savings from the proposed health care reforms in SB 7 and SB 8 will be.
“These bills move us toward a payment system that rewards quality outcomes rather than quantity of services, along with reducing our costs for unnecessary tests and preventable hospital readmissions,” said Senator Jane Nelson (R-Flower Mound). “We need to refocus our payment system on the true goal: healthy outcomes for Texans.”
Representative Lois Kolkhorst, Dr. Tom Garcia of the Texas Medical Association, and Dan Stultz, CEO of the Texas Hospital Association, also spoke at the press conference and expressed their support for the legislation.
SB 7 is focused on Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program. If passed, its provisions would reduce Medicaid payments when patients are readmitted for preventable illnesses, establish co-payments for unnecessary emergency room visits, provide incentives for providers who reduce waste and improve quality of care, and begin the process of studying whether pay-for-performance is doable in long-term care.
SB 8 would change the Health Care Policy Council’s name to the Texas Institute of Health Care Quality and Efficiency and alter its mission to “improving outcomes for all Texans, including state employees, teachers and others who use Texas health care programs.” The plan proposes establishing a statewide system of performance payments based on improving patient care quality and finding efficiencies. In addition, the bill also calls for testing health care models that have proven to be effective, requiring public disclosure of “potentially preventable readmissions and complications,” and requiring the Department of State Health Services to cooperate with hospitals to create standardized patient ID wristbands and study the possibility of reporting potentially preventable illnesses in long-term care facilities.