Texas must reform the unsustainable Medicaid program or else face economic stress, said Gov. Rick Perry at a press conference with U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt and other lawmakers. In his reform plan outlined in a Friday press release, Perry suggested customizing benefit packages to specific populations, assisting with enrollment in private insurance and employer-sponsored plans, and promoting health savings accounts and consumer-directed services. He also hinted at transparency initiatives: “health care is the only major sector of the economy where consumers don’t know the prices they pay nor do they have much of an incentive to care,” Perry said in a released text of remarks.

Perry also said he will announce other health care initiatives in the coming weeks, but “there is no doubt that Medicaid reform is the biggest health care challenge we face.”

Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched

For a few fleeting weeks, lawmakers, policy groups and lobbyists drooled over a projected $14.3 billion budget surplus announced by Texas Comptroller Susan Combs shortly before the 80 th Legislative Session began. Lawmakers still face a surplus of new money, but after the Legislative Budget Board submitted its recommendations for how the pie should be divided—$6.9 billion to pay for local school property tax cuts for the next four years, $1.4 billion for growth in education and health care programs, $1 billion for the 2006 school finance bill, and so on—what remains is a $2.5 billion surplus to be divvied between several legislative priorities. The 2008-2009 LBB recommendation report—all 947 pages of it—is available on the Legislative Budget Board’s Web site.

House committee appointments announced

After Lt. Governor David Dewhurst posted the Senate committee appointments last week, this week at the Capitol was filled with anticipation of the House committee appointments. Patience paid off as House Speaker Tom Craddick posted the appointments late Friday afternoon.

TAFP will pay close attention to three House committees expected to handle health care issues, the House Committee on Appropriations, the House Committee on Insurance and the House Committee on Public Health. View a complete list of House committee assignments though the Texas Legislature’s Web site.

Eiland files bill to protect physicians from health plans’ unscrupulous practices

Rep. Craig Eiland (D-Galveston) filed House Bill 839 to prohibit third-party payers from “renting out” a physician’s contracted rates to others unless the physician specifically grants permission. The bill aims to regulate physicians’ payment relationships with entities that exist “for the sole purpose of trafficking in physician discounts,” such as insurance brokers, third-party administrators, local or regional preferred provider organizations or self-insured employers, according to the bill. The need to regulate the trade of physician rates exists because “the unregulated secondary market in physician discounts is not only increasingly sophisticated, but has evolved in a part of the system that lacks transparency.”

Thanks to these Physicians of the Day

Thanks to Ann Trevino, M.D., Henry Boehm, M.D., Todd Thames, M.D., and Jay Gruhlkey, M.D., who each served as Physician of the Day at the Capitol. For more information on how you can serve as Physician of the Day, contact Kate McCann at TAFP. Spots are still available in February, March, April and May.