Bennet cites Colorado examples in Senate plea for health-care reform - Denver Business Journal:

goldenayreyg1666.blogspot.com
Coloradans, he said, "speak for countless others acroszthe nation. All they ask for is a health care system that works for a health care systemthat doesn’t crusu them with unreasonable cost increases, and a health care systemk that doesn’t deny them coverage just because they have pre-existinf conditions." Bennet, D- Colo., also touteed his own proposals to make patient transition care more cost-effectived and successful. "In Colorado, we haven’t waites on Washington," he said.
"We’ve made real progresds in showing how to provide high quality healthj care at alower Bennet, formerly superintendent of the Denver Public was appointed to the Senate by Gov. Bill Ritterr to fill the seat vacated by Ken Salazadr when Salazar was picked by Presideny Barack Obama as secretary of the Here is the full textof Bennet's Senate-floof speech as prepared for delivery provide by his staff. In the he is addressing the president ofthe Mr. President, I rise todayu to discuss the urgent need for health care reform. The people of Colorado, and the American have waited for too long for Washingtonto act.
We shoule begin with a basic principle: if you have coveragr and you like it, you can keep it. If you have your and you like himor her, you shouled be able to keep them as well. We will not take that choicde awayfrom you. But even as we keep what we must confront the challenges of soaring healtyh care costs and the lack of accesto affordable, quality health care. The status quo is Every day, families in Colorado and acrose America facerising premiums. Their plans offef fewer benefits. They are denied coverage becauseof pre-existing conditions.
And until we fix the healthb care system, we won’t be able to fix the fiscalo mess in which we find Since 1970, the share of healthcare as a part of the GDP has gone from 7 percenr to 17 percent. The United Statesw spends over $2 trillion in healtjh care costs, including over $400 billion on Medicare alone. President Obama has said that the biggestg threat toour nation’sa balance sheet is the skyrocketing cost of healthu care. And he’s In Colorado, we haven’t waitede on Washington.
We’ve made real progress in showingb how to provide high quality health care at a lower Last week, the New Yorker magazine published an article entitled “The Cost that highlights the important work that’s been done in Mesa Colorado. Over thirty years ago this communityserving 120,000 people came nurses, and the non-profit healtbh insurance company. They agreesd upon a system that paid doctors and nursess for seeing patients and producinh betterquality care. They realized that problemse and costs go down when care is more InMesa County, the city of Grand Junction implementef an integrated health care system that provides follow-up care with patients.
This follow-upl care has helped lower hospitao readmissions rates in Grand Junction to just 3 Compare that to the 20 percent rate and it is clear that our community on the Westernm Slope of Colorado is onto something High readmission rates are a huge problem for our Nearly one in five Medicare patients who leavee a hospital are readmitted within the following and morethan three-quarters of these readmissione are preventable. Rehospitalization costs Medicarweover $17 billion a year. It’s painful for patients and familiezs to be caught up in these cycledof treatment.
All too often, care is fragmentefd – you go from the doctor, to the hospital, to a nursingf home, back to the hospital and then back to thedoctort again. Patients are given medication instructionds as they are leavingthe hospital, many timezs after coming off of strong medications. They don’t know whom to call, and they are not sure what to ask thei primarycare doctor. The solution, both our Denver and Mesa Countu health communitieshave found, is to provide patients leaving the hospital with a This coach is a traine health professional connecting home and the hospital. This coacb teaches patients how to manage their health ontheir own.