PBGH in the News

A Never Event is a medical error that should never happen, but they still do.  The Leapfrog Group asks hospitals to take a proactive stance on managing them.  Learn more

Elizabeth Mitchell sent a letter to the Senate HELP Committee on Tuesday, following her influential testimony at the Committee’s hearing on June 18. 

Read and listen to PBGH President and CEO Elizabeth Mitchell’s testimony before the U.S. Senate HELP Committee on June 18th and hear her share how care should and can be high quality and affordable.

PBGH President & CEO Elizabeth Mitchell is quoted in this Kaiser Health News article on surpirse medical billing.

Lauren Vela is quoted in Modern Healthcare about low-value care. Please thank your Cigna (and now Aetna) plans for taking a stand against low-value Vitamin D screening; however there is plenty more waste to address. The article showcases the value of all-payer-claims-databases to identify and address opportunities, and describes the grant-funded Virginia project to reduce waste (PBGH is a sub-contractor on the grant and is seeking interested employers with employees in Virginia to participate on an employer task force).

PBGH’s partners on the waste free formulary part II project (Johns Hopkins University) penned this excellent article about PBM contracting. The Lower Healthcare Cost Act, to which PBGH contributed, holds promise for “fixing” a broken PBM business model.

The Pacific Business Group on Health and The Integrated Benefits Institute held a daylong symposium on high-value innovations by large employers and key stakeholders to improve behavioral health care, access, employee experience and outcomes. This employer-focused meeting highlighted best practices in worksite initiatives to enhance benefit design, onsite clinic-based services, EAP and absence management. This convening of purchasers, health plans, physician organizations and other stakeholders addressed mental health and substance use disorders and showed how collaboration can improve health outcomes and productivity. See the meeting materials here.

Members of PBGH join other employers and healthcare purchasers to stop the unfair and harmful surprise billing that takes place due to no fault of patients accessing healthcare that they believe is in-network, or for which they have no choice.  Read more here.

PBGH joins together with Families USA and consumers, other purchasers, and family physicians to launch CONSUMERS F1RST to make healthcare high-quality and affordable for individuals and their families.   

In this new Forbes article PBGH’s CEO, Elizabeth Mitchell, comments on a newly released study illustrating wide variance between Medicare rates and what self-insured employers pay for hospital services. This important study shines a light on the substantial cost shift and challenges in our consolidated healthcare market.