Former HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt said physicians need to lead the change in the health care system. | File photo
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Keri Carbaugh | Jan 24, 2017

Former HHS secretary calls on physicians to spearhead change

Former Utah governor and former Health and Human Service Secretary Mike Leavitt said physicians need to lead the change in the health care system for it to work.

Leavitt, who served in President George W. Bush's cabinet, spoke to physicians at the American Medical Association State Legislative Strategy Conference in Amelia Island, Florida. He addressed speculation the Affordable Care Act will be repealed which concerns some physicians because of the possible change which may result, including the change on the payment system transformation with the new Quality Payment Program.

“We have found our way into a new kind of payment model that is the result of what we have learned over the last 15 or 20 years,” Leavitt said. “But it’s not perfect, and we are not very good at it yet.”

After the repeal of the Sustainable Growth Rate formula and the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act replacing it, physicians led an effort to form a more efficient health care system for both physicians and patients.

Leavitt noted that he had two voices he would listen to during his time as HHS Secretary. The first was the chief financial officer of a business who worried the U.S. would no longer be a competitor if it didn’t fix health care costs. The second was from a physician, reminding Leavitt that failing at transformation would be devastating to patients.

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