This spring, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt visited Milwaukee to honor the work being done here toward creating a value-driven health care system.

During a Town Hall meeting at Bucyrus International Inc. in South Milwaukee, Secretary Leavitt recognized the Business Health Care Group as a Community Leader of public-private cooperative efforts to implement value-driven health care. The Wisconsin Collaborative for Healthcare Quality also was recognized as one of only six organizations nationally designated as a Better Quality and Information for Medicare Beneficiaries Pilot. Read More

by Dianne Kiehl

With your help, the Business Health Care Group is exerting ever-stronger impact on the way health care is used, managed and delivered. To improve our health care costs problem, we're reaching out to a wide range of public and private organizations throughout southeastern Wisconsin.

How is your support helping to control costs? Here are just a few of the things we're doing:

• Providing cost information on 30 inpatient and 26 outpatient procedures to help consumers more easily make health care cost comparisons.
• Developing a series of online modules that help consumers understand the health care system so they can make better health care decisions.
• Sponsoring disease management initiatives aimed at reducing the demand for costly health care services in the long-run.
• Assisting Humana in developing transparency tools such as the Hospital Cost Estimator, which provides comprehensive episode-of-care fee information for all network providers.
• Requiring provider action plans to promote provider accountability in cost savings initiatives.
• Supporting statewide transparency efforts to gather and publish health care costs and effectiveness data.
• Partnering with Humana to create a high-performance health care network that helps hold down costs and ensure quality care for member companies and their employees. Read More

The Business Health Care Group is pleased to announced the launch of the next three more modules in our online education series, "A Buyer's Guide to Health Care," available exclusively to member organizations on our website. These interactive modules lay out the issues in a memorable, easy- to- understand format. Read More

The Business Health Care Group has been making significant progress in our efforts to increase the number of area physicians recognized in diabetic care and management by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA).

Last fall, the BHCG received a $25,000 grant from Novo Nordisk, a world leader in diabetes care, to help ensure that our region has an adequate number of physicians who can provide quality care for diabetic patients. Managing this chronic disease properly improves quality of life and also reduces overall health care costs. Read More

To learn more about WELCOA and Well City USA, click here

While the focus of the Business Health Care Group is on reducing health care costs by increasing competition, there's no question that wellness programs are a critical component in the mix.

The BHCG recognizes that the Wellness Councils of America (WELCOA) is well positioned to help lower costs by decreasing demand for health care services. That's why the BHCG endorses WELCOA's Well City USA initiative. North America's premier resource for worksite wellness has created Well City USA to help build healthy communities by engaging entire business communities in improving the health and wellbeing of their workforces. Read More

New Packages Cap Annual Increases at 6 percent or Lower
Starting July 1, small business members of the Business Health Care Group will have access to a series of new health insurance packages designed to alleviate the financial stresses of increasing health insurance costs. Read More