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Providers

What Happens Next

With more than 900 pages of content, the new health care reform law covers more programs and initiatives than can be profiled here. However, the main concepts and intent can be summarized with a few key terms:

Quality improvements
Measuring performance
New care delivery/payment models
Transparency
Financial incentives

Signing the health care reform bills into law did not end the decision-making process. The law gives the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, and other officials in state and federal government, the authority to make a large number of determinations and rules as the program unfolds.

To see how much decision making remains in health care reform, you can read the legislative language itself and note the number of initiatives that involve pilots, demonstrations, funding grants, review boards and other techniques that reinforce the information-gathering phase of many activities. In other words, many opportunities remain for health care providers to offer input.

Health care reform continues to be a topic of heated political debate. Some in congress have come out in favor of repealing the law. We can't predict what will happen, but throughout history, federal programs involving health care have seldom been reversed.

Regardless, at Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina, we're rolling up our sleeves and doing our part to implement health care reform, and to make the new law work for North Carolina. The role of providers will be equally important.