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 August Cheap drugs: coming to a pharmacy near you The state’s prescription purchasing pool is on a fast track. The program is intended to help low-income seniors and government agencies purchase drugs at reduced prices. Its administrator, Missy Dolan, is eager to prove it can happen. On Aug. 16, she finalized a bid document due back by Sept. 7, which will solicit proposals from pharmacy benefit managers and third party administrators. Not only will the company that’s chosen negotiate discounts from pharmaceutical companies, it will also handle administrative services to support the program. “We’d like them to do those services for specific fees, and we’ll choose the best value based on those fees,” said Dolan, who’s housed in the Office of Health Policy and Research. Earhart contract for OHP renewed Last year William Earhart, the contractor that collects premiums from Oregon Health Plan members, upped its monthly charges from $1.33 to $2.93 per member after renewing its state contract. Since some premiums are as low as $6 per month, advocates questioned the logic of giving half of the money to the company processing the paperwork. Paying for performance Safety first. It’s not only good for patients, it’s also good for the bottom line. For the first time, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services have linked hospital reimbursement to health care quality. Well, sort of. As a result of the Medicare Modernization Act, hospitals that don’t report quality data won’t receive full reimbursement from the government. Instead, they’ll get a 0.4 percent lighter check. The move may be a big step toward linking payments directly to quality. Where’s the vending machines? If at first democracy doesn’t succeed, try, try again. Except don’t bother using democracy on the second attempt. That only muddles the matter. Instead, try a more dictatorial process. That seems to be the philosophy of a new task force designed to create an administrative rule outlawing high-calorie snack foods in schools. Sen. Bill Morrisette (D–Springfield) set forth a similar proposal –– Senate Bill 651 –– last legislative session. The idea generated a hearing, but never made it out of committee. Counties rebuffed Try again. That’s the message the governor’s office gave the Conference of Local Health Officials when it suggested raising per capita spending on public health from $0.59 to $2.50. The idea was presented to Erinn Kelley-Siel, the governor’s health policy advisor. Saif’s semantics Proponents of abolishing the state’s workers’ compensation agency argue it would raise $500 million to fill Oregon’s depleted coffers. That’s not the message voters will receive when they open their voter’s pamphlets. The just-released financial impact statement in the pamphlet suggests eliminating Saif will cost between $2.2 and $2.4 billion because the state will have to buy reinsurance on existing claims after it sells off the agency. Are docs in or out? Are doctors fleeing Oregon in record numbers or flocking here. It depends who you ask. OSPIRG believes physicians are increasingly calling the Beaver State home. In a report using data from Oregon’s Office of Rural Health, it suggests “the number of doctors practicing in specialty fields (in Oregon), such as obstetrics and gynecology....has increased at a faster rate than during the 1990s, when non-economic damages in malpractice cases were capped.” Economics take center stage Play nice. That’s the message the Oregon Medical Association wants to send to hospitals and insurers. The OMA plans to seek legislative remedies to prevent physicians from being subjected to economic credentialing, which can bump them off an insurance panel or result in the loss of hospital privileges because of economic reasons. For example, a hospital can kick a surgeon off their staff because he has a financial interest in a competing hospital. Disruptive physicians Afraid of getting pushed out for speaking up, physicians are rallying to fight what they call an unfair law that muzzles them. Dr. Bonnie Lees is leading the charge against what’s known as the disruptive physician doctrine, which is used by hospital administrators to get rid of trouble-making doctors. When that occurs, the doctor faces an internal peer review process and can be dismissed and blacklisted in the National Practitioner Data Bank. Also in this issue...
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