Hawaii-2012-HCR174-Introduced

WHEREAS, for more than 20 years, the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care has documented glaring variations in how medical resources are distributed and used in the United States; and

WHEREAS, the Dartmouth Atlas Project uses Medicare data to provide information and analysis about national, regional, and local markets, as well as hospitals and their affiliated physicians; and

WHEREAS, this research has helped policymakers, the media, health care analysts, and others improve their understanding of the nation's health care system and forms the foundation for many of the ongoing efforts to improve health and health systems in America; and

WHEREAS, many of the fundamental ideas covered in the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care are of great use in improving Hawaii's health care system; and

WHEREAS, the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care focuses on the issue of rapidly increasing Medicare spending and rapidly rising health care costs, which pose a serious threat not only to the future of public and private health insurance coverage, but also to the sustainability of efforts to expand coverage to the millions of uninsured Americans; and

WHEREAS, the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care reports many additional studies and articles relating to Medicare that include expenditure measures by hospital referral region; information on health care spending, quality, and outcomes; and its project brief, "The Policy Implications of Variations in Medicare Spending Growth", which all may be used by insurance companies and health care providers to improve their decision-making; and

WHEREAS, the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care also contains an extensive amount of information available to Hawaii's insurance providers on supply-sensitive care, which refers to the major influence that the availability of specific resources has on utilization rates; and

WHEREAS, supply-sensitive care patterns account for more than half of all Medicare spending and understanding the problem of supply-sensitive care is a critical first step toward improving the quality and affordability of health care, building organized delivery systems, and scaling back costs and cost growth; and

WHEREAS, the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care has demonstrated that:

(1) In regions where there are relatively fewer medical resources, patients get less care; however, there is no evidence that these patients are worse off than their counterparts in high-resourced, high-spending regions;

(2) Patients do not experience improved survival or better quality of life if they live in regions with more available care: in fact, the care these patients receive appears to be worse; and

(3) Patients in high-resourced, high-spending regions report being less satisfied with their care than do patients in regions that spend less on health care and have more trouble accessing their physicians; and

WHEREAS, most studies have found that overall mortality is not better in higher-spending regions because the benefits to some patients are counterbalanced by the harm to others; and
WHEREAS, the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care provides valuable information on the patterns of health care delivery and practice across the United States and evaluates the quality of health care that Americans receive; now, therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Twenty-sixth Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2012, the Senate concurring, that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, private health insurers, and private health providers are urged to adopt the principles and health care guidelines in the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Concurrent Resolution be transmitted to the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Hawaii's Congressional Delegation, Governor of Hawaii, Director of Health, Director of Human Services, Board President of AlohaCare, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Hawaii Management Alliance Association, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Hawaii Medical Service Association, Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer of Humana Insurance Company, President of Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc., President and Chief Executive Officer of Summerlin Life & Health Insurance Co., President of United Health Alliance, President and Chief Executive Officer of United Healthcare Insurance Company, and Chief Executive Officer of Wellcare Health Insurance of Arizona Inc.

	OFFERED BY:	_____________________________

Report Title:

Dartmouth Atlas of Healthcare; Adoption of Principles and Guidelines

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.C.R. NO.	174
TWENTY-SIXTH LEGISLATURE, 2012
STATE OF HAWAII