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Mayo Clinic’s thoughts on the health reform bill

Posted by  in Monday, March 29th 2010   
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The following is publicly available from http://letstalk.mayo.edu.

Since the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act on March 21, we have received numerous questions about the law’s impact on Mayo Clinic. Details remain unclear, especially because Senate debate continues on a piece of legislation — the Reconciliation Bill – that amends a portion of the new health care reform law. Teams within Mayo and a small team of outside experts are diligently reviewing the final language of the bill and beginning to formulate comprehensive assessments of its impact on Mayo as a health care provider and as an employer.

While we don’t have all the answers yet, we want to address a few common questions. We will provide updated information and analysis on the impact to Mayo Clinic as it becomes available.

Did Mayo Clinic take a position on this bill?
No. We advocated for patient-centered health care reform, but we don’t take positions for or against legislation.

What does Mayo Clinic like and what are the concerns with this law?
Mayo Clinic recognizes that this legislation is an initial step toward reforming health care in the United States but acknowledges much more needs to be done. Specifically, the legislation includes insurance reform provisions and value-based payment provisions, which align with our recommendations. But lawmakers can do more to aggressively move Medicare toward a system that pays for value. Also, Congress needs to find a permanent fix to the Sustainable Growth Rate (SGR) physician payment system to prevent sudden limitation on access to care for Medicare patients.

How will the law affect patients?
For the majority of our patients who currently have insurance coverage, the new health care legislation will probably have little effect on continuing care at Mayo Clinic.  For patients who are currently uninsured, the current legislation may help them to afford and obtain health insurance.

How will the law affect Mayo Clinic’s employee health benefit plans?
Human Resources is working to understand the bill and its implications for our benefit plans. Many of the changes will be phased in over eight years, so we have time to respond. At present, we know that some measures of the legislation won’t affect us. For example, we don’t deny coverage to our employees based on pre-existing conditions and we cover preventive services. But new limits on flexible spending accounts likely will impact our benefit plan. Our goal is to provide information as soon as we understand the legislation and what we’ll need to do to comply. What will not change is our commitment to provide employees with sustainable benefits and supporting them in achieving their health goals.

What is Mayo Clinic’s role going forward?
Mayo Clinic is committed to assisting with the effective implementation of legislation as well as the development of future patient-centered health care reform legislation. OurHealthPolicyCenter will continue to collaborate with key partners.

For more detailed information and more resources, go to http://letstalk.mayo.edu.

John Noseworthy, M.D.
President and CEO, Mayo Clinic

Shirley Weis
Chief Administrative Officer, Mayo Clinic

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