Senators Kent Conrad (D-ND) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) have asked the Government Accountability Office to find best practices used by states and other countries, as well as individual hospitals, to see if such methods could be applied across the U.S.
In a letter to the agency, the senators asked it to focus more tightly on improving health outcomes and boosting preventive and wellness care for patients in the healthcare system. They noted that healthcare spending by both public and private payers has been growing about 2.5 percent more per year than the economy since 1960s, and that accounted for 20 percent of the GDP in just 10 years. They see the use of best practices as one powerful tool in fighting such cost increases.
To learn more about their request:
- read this Modern Healthcare piece [1] (reg. req.)
Links:
[1] http://www.modernhealthcare.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081125/REG/311259987