Listening In (With Permission): Conversations About Today's Pressing Health Care Topics

CPR's senior project & research manager, Roz Murray, calls Dr. Corey Waller, Physician and Consultant at Complex Care Consulting LLC, to talk about employers' challenges in identifying substance use disorders in their populations and the dearth in prescribing evidence-based treatments.

Andréa Caballero dials up Linda Schwimmer, President and CEO of the New Jersey Health Care Quality Institute, to hear about the challenges and successes of the health care marketplace in the Garden State, and find out which Scorecard 2.0 metric result is the one that our local sponsor is most excited to see! This is the first of a three-part series with the local sponsors of CPR’s Scorecard on Pay...

Suzanne calls Jennie Pao, Manager of Health Care Planning at Pitney Bowes, to learn about her experience with the ACO performance reports Pitney Bowes receives from its health plans and why she joined Catalyst for Payment Reform's movement for greater transparency into health plan reporting.

Have we made headway in addressing the quality of maternity care, or haven’t we? Suzanne calls Elliott Main, obstetrician and Medical Director of the California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative (CMQCC), to find out. Listen in on his thoughts about both the biggest pain points and brights spots in US maternal health.

Suzanne dials up Leemore Dafny, a Harvard professor and economist, to find out how she keeps a “glass half full” outlook in the face of provider consolidation and higher prices in health care. She draws on her economics expertise to share specific ideas on what employers and others can do to increase competition.

Suzanne talks to Diane Meier, Director of the Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC) about a specialty that is not getting the attention it deserves yet- palliative care. Learn what it is and why we so desperately need to advance its use to help the many Americans with serious illness cope with pain in the United States, and save money in the process.

Suzanne turns to Marty Gaynor, an economics professor at Carnegie Mellon and former Director of the Bureau of Economics at the Federal Trade Commission, to explain why we all need to pay attention to the underlying dynamics of the health care market place, including how increased competition can improve quality, innovation, and the overall patient experience.

Episode 17: Andrea Ducas on how Scorecard 2.0 helps achieve RWJF's mission for a culture of health by Catalyst for Payment Reform

When Suzanne wants to get a sense of what Americans are thinking about health care issues, she calls Mollyann Brodie, the Executive Director of Public Opinion and Survey Research at the Kaiser Family Foundation. Find out the surprising things Mollyann has learned in surveying Americans impacted by the opioid epidemic in the U.S.

Suzanne asks Dr. Kavita Patel, a Nonresident Fellow at the Brookings Institution and a practicing primary care physician, the toughest questions about rising pharmacy prices. What's behind the increase? Why isn't value-based contracting more prevalent for drugs? Who can we really blame for high prices? What role can payment reform play? Listen in to hear the answers.

Suzanne has the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Neel Shah, an obstetrician and professor at Harvard Medical School, again. This time they focus on the surprising state of maternity care in the U.S today including cost, the c-section rate, the maternal mortality rate, our paid family leave, and more

Listen in as Suzanne chats with Francois de Brantes, Vice President and Director at The Altarum Institute, about a brand new benefit design called Medical Episode Spending Accounts (MESA)that build on value-based insurance design to reduce out of pocket costs for consumers.

Suzanne chats with Dr. Neel Shah, an obstetrician and professor at Harvard Medical School, about how surprising it is that many providers still don't know what health care costs and what he's been trying to do about it.

Suzanne talks to Mark Fendrick, the Director of University of Michigan's Center for Value-based Insurance Design (VBID), about his dream of designing a benefit that reimburses generously for the care consumers need most and where the VBID movement is headed now. Learn more about the work of the V-BID Center by visiting vbidcenter.org.

Take this special opportunity to listen to Suzanne talk to her father Tom Delbanco, MD, Professor at Harvard Medical School and co-founder of OpenNotes. He discusses his efforts break down the walls between providers and patients by allowing them to share notes. Apparently being a health care pioneer runs in the family!

Suzanne Delbanco dials up Jen Benz, founder and CEO of Benz Communications, to tackle a range of topics related to employee benefits communication, including personalized messaging, technology trends, privacy concerns, and the age old challenge of getting consumers to engage with their health.

Listen to Suzanne chat with Mary Bradley, Director of Healthcare Planning at Pitney Bowes, about how and why she works with other employers to get stronger and smarter in her health care purchasing practices.

Suzanne Delbanco, Executive Director of Catalyst for Payment Reform, dials up Jeff Selberg, Executive Director of the Peterson Center on Healthcare, to chat about the foundation's goal to make health care more affordable for our country and why we need to push within both the private and public sector to do it.

Listen in as Suzanne drops a line to Mike Thompson, the President and CEO of the National Alliance of Health Care Purchaser Coalitions, to give each other an often-needed reminder that the patient is at the center of our health care system. Find out what Mike thinks about the consumerism movement and why he thinks we're at an important inflection point.

Listen in as Suzanne dials up Bob Galvin, Chief Executive Officer of Equity Healthcare and one of Catalyst for Payment Reform's founders, to discuss why he founded CPR, where we are today, and what keeps him up at night these days.

Listen in as Suzanne dials up Peter Lee, Executive Director of Covered California. He runs one of the country's most successful state exchanges and has gained valuable perspective in the process. Find out what surprises people the most about Covered California and how you need to be creative with benefit design to succeed today.

Suzanne caught up with Vince Kerr, President of Care Solutions at UnitedHealth Care, which is lucky as he recently announced his retirement. Find out how employers might be able to get more value from their health plan partners and what one piece of advice he gives those of us committed to improving the health care system.

Listen to Suzanne chat with Jay Want, the Chief Medical Officer of the Center for Improving Value in Health Care (CIVHC), a general internist and a self-professed "wonky nerd." Find out how health care providers feel working in today's health care landscape and what we all have to be optimistic about.