AAOS Encouraged by Administration’s Plan to Promote Healthcare Competition

Washington, DC—American Association of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS) President David A. Halsey, MD, released the following statement after the Administration issued a report outlining policies to increase choice and competition in health care: 

 

“The AAOS is encouraged by the recommendations made by the Administration to reform the American health care system through increased choice and competition. We share the mutual goal of delivering high quality care at affordable prices and want to emphasize our support for the following recommendations—many of which the AAOS has long advocated for at both the state and federal level on behalf of our members and their patients.

 

“Lifting restrictions on physician-owned hospitals is a necessary step to improving quality of care, reducing costs, and giving patients access to facilities in their own communities. Additionally, positively realigning incentives through payment reform, such as site neutrality, will also empower patients to make their own health care decisions and increase price transparency—another recommendation of the Administration. To address potential antitrust and provider consolidation concerns, federal antitrust laws should apply to the business of health insurance. Finally, certificate-of-need (CON) laws should be repealed or scaled back, removing an additional anticompetitive element of the current health care marketplace. 

 

“In coordination, these critical changes to our current system will promote the patient choice and competition we desperately need. The AAOS is pleased to see these Administration recommendations echo our own initiatives, and we stand ready to aid both agencies and lawmakers in accomplishing this goal.”