By Ted Shaw, President/CEO, Texas Hospital Association
With the start of a new year and a new decade, we reflect on our past achievements and challenges, and look forward to the promise of a new year. It’s an opportunity for a new beginning and a more refined focus. We take stock and plan new courses of action to better our lives, with resolutions to eat better, exercise more, and reduce stress. Texas hospitals, too, are working together to pave the way for a healthier Texas. To protect the health and well-being of the communities they serve, Texas hospitals will pursue a number of important public policy priorities. We commit to strengthening the state’s health care infrastructure and fostering regulatory and legislative environments that will empower us to provide the highest quality care.
Like diet and exercise, access to health care services in the community is essential for overall health. In 2020, Texas hospitals are advocating for funding for health care programs and services to meet the physical and behavioral health care needs of a growing population. We also are backing policies to increase the number of Texans with affordable, private health insurance. Texas continues to lead the nation in the number and percentage—5 million and 17.7%—of residents who lack any form of health care coverage. Building on what works, rather than reinventing the system, is key.
While the Texas Legislature has supported behavioral health care in recent years, significant investment still is needed to ensure timely and appropriate access to outpatient, community-based services, and inpatient psychiatric care. In 2018, 73% of Texas counties were designated by the federal government as having too few mental health providers and services, and it is widely known that the need outpaces the supply for behavioral health services in Texas. Securing funding for behavioral health care that is commensurate with the state’s need for services and psychiatric beds is critical.
Funding for outpatient, community-based care will help keep Texans on the path to prevention. But for those who need intensive or emergent care, Texas hospitals are equipped and staffed with experts who can provide specialized care to any Texan who needs it. Hospitals constantly are working to improve care quality and increase patient safety and satisfaction. Adequate reimbursement is integral to ensure hospitals can keep their doors open to provide that care. Since 2013, Texas has seen more hospital closures than any other state in the nation. Others have reduced services, most commonly labor and delivery, leaving many rural women with no access to routine obstetric care or to labor and delivery services near home.
As the debate around national health care continues to grow, Texas hospitals will advocate for a regulatory environment that promotes, not impedes, access to quality and affordable health services. That means working with the federal health agency to identify acceptable methods of financing Medicaid payments that are critical for providing care for Medicaid enrollees and the uninsured. Hospitals will protect patients from surprise medical bills while preserving adequate health plan networks and provider choice.
Texas hospitals have the privilege of helping bring new life into the world, healing the sick, and honoring those at the end of life. Our mission is improving the health and well-being of every life we touch. Throughout 2020, Texas hospitals will pursue a strong set of priorities to achieve that goal.