Reach for Universal Coverage Measure Care Provide Consumers with Information Reward Providers for Doing a Better Job Adopt Health Information Technology Reengineer How We Deliver Health Care Reduce Disparities in Quality of Care Download All Fact Sheets (PDF) (Word)

We Must Build Health Care Value As a nation, we spend far more on health care per capita than any other country in the world -- $6,697 for every man, woman, and child in 2005.  Yet, the United States ranks only 37th out of 191 countries in providing quality care, and we have the highest proportion of the population without health care coverage of all industrialized nations.  We are spending more and more each year on health care, and yet millions remain uninsured and none of us receive consistently high quality, cost effective care. PBGH has worked hard for many years to bring this message to policy makers in California and in Washington, D.C.  This year, as political leaders in Congress and

state houses across America are discussing real solutions for change, PBGH has been at the forefront of making the case for building health care value.

PBGH believes that any health care reform, whether it is an incremental approach or a total overhaul of our current system, must build health care value.  We must provide quality care at an affordable price.  Without ensuring quality, access to care may be meaningless, or even dangerous.  And without addressing runaway costs and inefficiencies, care becomes even more inaccessible.  By building health care value into state and national reform measures, we can ensure that Americans get what they deserve – the right care at the right time at a fair price.

Below, you will find summaries of the critical areas in which health care fails to provide good value, as well as potential solutions to build health care value and make our system work well for all it serves.  We hope that you will download these fact sheets to learn more about these issues, and to use them when you talk to policy makers, opinion leaders and stakeholders as we continue to discuss the need for value-based reform.  You can download PDF versions of the fact sheets, as well as Word versions you can alter and personalize for your own use.

Together, we must:

Reach for Universal Coverage

The Problem: Health care costs and premium increases are unsustainable.  Working Americans are losing their insurance, adding to the ranks of 46 million who already are uninsured.  The increasing cost of underfunded public programs and care for the uninsured and underinsured continues to be shifted onto the ever smaller population of insured.

Toward a Solution: Expand coverage to all.  At the state and national level, stakeholders are discussing ways to increase coverage including expanding public programs, mandating individuals obtain insurance, requiring a payroll tax from employers, or adopting a single-payer system.  Whatever the final solution, we should seek to cover all Americans.

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Measure Care to Understand Performance

The Problem: We know there is huge variation in the quality of health care, but we don't know who is or isn't delivering the right care at the right time.  Without better information, providers cannot improve their performance and consumers cannot make better choices.

Toward a Solution: Create a transparent health care system.

Fact Sheet: For a comprehensive overview of this issue (PDF) (Microsoft Word)

Other Resources:

• A Pocket Guide to Seven Key Measurement Issues- Consumer Purchaser Disclosure Project

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Provide Consumers with Useful Quality and Price Information

The Problem: Health care consumers cannot compare the quality or efficiency of care offered by medical practitioners, clinics and hospitals to make good choices. 

Toward a Solution: Provide tools that help consumers make good health care decisions.

Fact Sheet: For a comprehensive overview of this issue (PDF) (Microsoft Word)

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Reward Providers for Doing a Better Job

The Problem: Our health care system pays providers for the number of treatments and procedures they provide and pays more for using expensive technology or surgical interventions.  It is not designed to reward better quality or to support care coordination or prevention.

Toward a Solution: Design a payment system that rewards providers for giving the right care at the right time.

Fact Sheet: For a comprehensive overview of this issue (PDF) (Microsoft Word)

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Adopt Health Information Technology

The Problem: Doctors, hospitals and other providers still rely on paper to record and transfer information, making care delivery slower, more error-prone and harder to measure and coordinate than it should be.  Additionally, patients are not regularly given written information about their care and treatment, making it difficult for them to remember and manage their care effectively.

Toward a Solution: Encourage the rapid adoption of health information technology.

Fact Sheet: For a comprehensive overview of this issue (PDF) (Microsoft Word)

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Reengineer How We Deliver Health Care

The Problem: Our current health care system uses outdated methods to deliver care and, as a result, we encourage unnecessary care provided in a high-cost, poor-quality environment.   Without rapidly making both easy-to-implement and more complex improvements, we will continue to squander precious resources on a broken system.

Toward a Solution: Create a health care system that delivers the right care at the right time in the right setting.

Fact Sheet: For a comprehensive overview of this issue (PDF) (Microsoft Word)

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Reduce Disparities in Quality of Care

The Problem: People of color, limited English speakers and poor people often receive lower quality health care, even when they have the same health care coverage as other populations.

Toward a Solution: Ensure our health care system provides high quality care for everyone. 

Fact Sheet: For a comprehensive overview of this issue (PDF) (Microsoft Word)

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About Building Health Care Value

As the debate on how best to reform our broken health care system continues, many can agree that the current system covers too few, costs too much, and does not deliver consistently high-quality care.  This document is part of a series seeking to assure that the reform discussion addresses how to ensure patients receive quality, affordable care.  Without ensuring quality, access to care may be meaningless.  Without addressing costs, care becomes inaccessible.  By building health care value into reform measures, we can ensure that Americans get the right care at the right time.

Download this Overview (PDF) (Microsoft Word)

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