Guest Editorial: A Wakeup Call for Louisiana Businesses on Louisiana Medical News

Guest Editorial: A Wakeup Call for Louisiana Businesses

By: Mike Reitz, BCBS-LA CEO

Mike Reitz, BlueCross BlueShield of LA CEO

The rising cost of healthcare is a major economic issue, here and across the nation. Healthcare spending in 2011 accounted for roughly 17 percent of our gross domestic product, or $2.5 trillion. That’s a little over $8,000 for every person in America. And the Congressional Budget Office projects it will rise to 25 percent of the GDP in 2025. Businesses that offer health insurance are absorbing these staggering increases, and this is cutting into their bottom line.

In the United States, some 155 million people get their insurance at work. In a nutshell, U.S. businesses subsidize more than 50 percent of all insured Americans. In Louisiana, the figure is 46 percent. A number of factors contribute to the rising cost of healthcare. Medical services top the list. Healthcare affordability is a complex problem, and we shouldn’t look to the federal government to address it.

The good news is that market forces in Louisiana are coming together to bring down the cost of healthcare in our state by embracing the patient-centered medical home, a coordinated care delivery model centered on quality. The evidence of cost savings through medical homes is powerful. And these impressive savings are being achieved by delivering the right care, at the right place, at the right time, not through the HMO “efficiencies” of the 1980s and ’90s.

In the medical home model, the emphasis is on quality care. Here are some examples:

• The Intermountain Healthcare Medical Group in Utah reported a 39 percent decrease in E.R. admissions, a 24 percent decrease in hospital admissions and a net reduction in overall per-patient spending of $640.

• The Veterans Health Administration, using the medical home care delivery system, recently reported a 27 percent reduction in both E.R. visits and hospitalizations, as well as 13 percent lower median healthcare costs for veterans.

Because of successes such as these, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana has embraced the medical home model. We’re sponsoring educational summits for healthcare stakeholders and the public on the positive effects of this revolutionary healthcare delivery model. Louisiana physicians are beginning to embrace the medical home, too. Blue Cross recently announced partnership in the first three medical home delivery systems in the Louisiana private healthcare market.

I know that soon our business community will also recognize that the medical home can both increase their bottom line and act as a powerful economic engine to move our state’s economy forward. When this happens, I am convinced they will join me in backing this important private sector initiative and let healthcare drive our economic recovery.

Mike Reitz is President & CEO, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana

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