FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Joe Martin, Communications Director
717-232-6787 or
Harrisburg, PA - May 1, 2003 - On May 1, 2003, FACCT - Foundation for Accountability is honoring the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council (PHC4) with the prestigious Ellwood Award in recognition of its outstanding efforts to foster a publicly accountable health care system. Named after Paul M. Ellwood Jr., MD, founder of the Jackson Hole Group who helped guide FACCT's development, PHC4 was recognized for its 2002 accomplishments using innovative financing models, which have challenged the health care system to become consumer-centered.
"PHC4 is honored to have been presented this year's esteemed Ellwood Award for our work in the area of health care reporting," stated Marc P. Volavka, Executive Director of PHC4. "We believe that holding the health care system publicly accountable is essential to quality improvement and cost containment, and our work has helped to cultivate informed decision-making in Pennsylvania and throughout the nation."
FACCT is a national organization working to improve health care for Americans by advocating for an accountable and accessible system where consumers are partners in their care and help shape the delivery of care. To achieve this goal, FACCT creates tools to help people make quality-based decisions, develops consumer-focused quality measures, supports public education about health care quality, fosters efforts to collect quality data and informs public policy.
This year, which marks FACCT's sixth presentation of the Ellwood Awards, PHC4 was one of four organizations nationally that were recognized for their 2002 accomplishments. Past winners of the award include the American Diabetes Association, the Business Roundtable's Leapfrog Group, the California Public Employees Retirement System, Families USA Foundation, the Health Care Financing Administration and the Institute of Medicine.
"This year's award recipients provide powerful examples of the ideas Paul Ellwood has advocated: consumer-centered health care and an accountable and accessible system. The 2003 Ellwood Award winners are helping to transform the system with programs and projects that push for overall accountability and improvement." said David Lansky, PhD - President of FACCT.
Created in 1986 by the General Assembly and the Governor of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, PHC4 is an independent state agency that works to improve the quality and restrain the cost of health care through the collection, analysis, and public dissemination of uniform cost and quality-related information. The Council has published hundreds of reports since its creation; some of the most recent include: the Hospital Financial Analysis 2002, Volume One; Hospital Performance Report 2001; Measuring the Quality of Commercial HMOs 2001; Choosing a Medicare Managed Care Plan - A Guide for Medicare Beneficiaries; Diabetes Hospitalization Report; and the physician-specific Pennsylvania's Guide to Coronary Artery Bypass Graft (CABG) Surgery 2000. For more information about PHC4 and for free copies of PHC4's reports, visit the agency's Web site at www.phc4.org or call (717) 232-6787. Questions about FACCT can be directed to Aryne Blumklotz (503) 449-1630, ablumklotz@facct.org