Bill Text: CT SB00443 | 2017 | General Assembly | Comm Sub
Bill Title: An Act Concerning The Monitoring Of Health Care Trends By The Attorney General.
Spectrum: Committee Bill
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2017-03-24 - Referred to Joint Committee on Public Health [SB00443 Detail]
Download: Connecticut-2017-SB00443-Comm_Sub.html
General Assembly |
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January Session, 2017 |
LCO No. 5566 | ||
*05566SB00443PH_* | |||
Referred to Committee on PUBLIC HEALTH |
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Introduced by: |
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(PH) |
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AN ACT CONCERNING THE MONITORING OF HEALTH CARE TRENDS BY THE ATTORNEY GENERAL.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Assembly convened:
Section 1. (NEW) (Effective October 1, 2017) (a) The Attorney General shall monitor the state's health care market for the purposes of increasing public transparency regarding health care costs and health care cost trends and assisting the General Assembly and executive branch agencies in developing and implementing health care cost containment policies.
(b) The Attorney General may require that any health care provider, provider organization or payer produce documents, answer interrogatories and provide testimony under oath related to health care costs and health care cost trends, factors that contribute to cost growth within the state's health care system and the relationship between provider costs and a payer's premium rates. The Attorney General may review and analyze any relevant information submitted to or in the possession of the Office of Health Care Access, the Insurance Department, the State Comptroller or any other state agency or office. Except as provided in this subsection, the Attorney General shall keep confidential all nonpublic information and documents obtained under this section and shall not disclose the information or documents to any person without the consent of the health care provider, provider organization or payer that produced the information or documents. The Attorney General may disclose information and documents obtained in a public hearing, a rate hearing before the Insurance Department or, in a case brought by the Attorney General, if the Attorney General believes that such disclosure will promote the health care cost containment goals of the state and that the disclosure should be made in the public interest after taking into account any privacy, trade secret or anticompetitive considerations. The confidential information and documents shall not be public records and shall be exempt from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act, as defined in section 1-200 of the general statutes.
(c) Not later than January 1, 2018, and annually thereafter, the Attorney General shall publish a report regarding the state's health care market on its Internet web site. The report may include information on the following: (1) Total health care spending, (2) health care spending by payer type, (3) health care prices by provider type, (4) health care price disparities between provider types, (5) the relationship, if any, between the price of health care services and the quality of such services, (6) the relative effectiveness of various health care payment models and reform efforts, (7) health disparities by race and ethnicity, and (8) pharmaceutical costs, including the drivers of such costs and cost trends. The report shall identify health care market practices and trends that impact health care costs.
(d) Not later than thirty days after issuing the report required under subsection (c) of this section, the Attorney General shall convene a public hearing on the findings in such report. The Attorney General may compel health care providers, payers, state agencies and any other relevant individuals identified by the Attorney General to testify at such hearing and answer questions about the information and findings in the report and any other topics or questions identified in advance by the Attorney General.
(e) The Attorney General may hire consultants to assist in carrying out the provisions of this section.
This act shall take effect as follows and shall amend the following sections: | ||
Section 1 |
October 1, 2017 |
New section |
Statement of Purpose:
To address imperfections in the health care market.
[Proposed deletions are enclosed in brackets. Proposed additions are indicated by underline, except that when the entire text of a bill or resolution or a section of a bill or resolution is new, it is not underlined.]