Published by: Shawn Gremminger on 8/2/2010 10:07:39 AM
Last week, the Senate Appropriations Committee passed its Fiscal Year 2011 bill to fund the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and Education. Tucked into the $175 billion bill is $40 million to jump start the establishment of Community-Based Collaborative Care Networks (CCN) and to establish a program to fund community-health teams to assist medical homes. CCNs, a key legislative priority for NAPH and safety net hospitals, were authorized earlier this year in the health reform law.
When up and running, the CCN program will provide grants to consortia of safety net hospitals, community health centers and other providers to offer coordinated care to vulnerable populations in their communities. This program holds the promise of cost savings as previous models have been shown to reduce unnecessary emergency room visits and redundant care.
In a year in which the appropriations bills are particularly austere – the Labor-HHS-Education bill is $1 billion smaller than the President’s request – receiving new funding is a triumph for NAPH and the safety net. While this program has many champions on Capitol Hill – Reps. Gene Green, Bobby Rush, Linda Sanchez, and Debbie Wasserman-Schultz have all been important supporters – we can thank Sen. Patty Murray for securing this key start-up funding. Sen. Murray was key in ensuring that the authorization was included in the final health reform bill and used her position on the Appropriations Committee to allow the program to move forward by working with Subcommittee Chairman Tom Harkin to find funding in the bill.
Our work for the year isn’t yet done. This fall, appropriators will work to combine the Senate Labor-H bill with the bill drafted by the House, which doesn’t include money for CCNs. NAPH will with our hospitals to make sure that we retain the funding in a final bill.