UCLA Faculty Association: Watch the Regents' Health Services Committee Meeting of Aug. 9, 2023

The Daily Cal provides a summary of the August 9th meeting of the Regents' Health Service Committee below. Note that I have sent a comment to the reporter concerning the presentation of yours truly on the improper cancellation of survivors' health insurance.

Savan Bullo, 8-10-23

The UC Board of Regents’ Health Services Committee convened at UCLA on Wednesday morning to vote on two action items. These items were an approval for adding new categories of performance measures to the UC Health, or UCH, Clinical Quality Dashboard and a research affiliation between UCLA and the Institute for Immunology and Immunotherapy, or III. The committee also received updates on the department of Health Policy and Regulatory Affairs, or HPRA, and the UC Center for Data-Driven Insights and Innovation.

During public comments before the closed session, UCLA service workers asked the Regents for improved wages, and medical fellows expressed concerns over the lengthy process to receive a medical fellowship license. The HPRA is “aware and (is) very concerned” about the amount of applications that need to be processed by September, said Tam Ma, associate vice president for the department. “We are in direct conversations with the medical board to work on ways to ensure they are able to process those applications timely and we also plan to … make (the legislature) aware of these issues,” Ma said.

Other public commenters included doctors at St. Mary’s Medical Center looking for representation in the integration process as UCSF acquires St. Mary’s. Also present was a representative of the UCLA, UCSB and UCSF Emeriti Associations urging for a better UC retiree health plan.*

During the meeting, the committee questioned why UC academic health centers, which contain only about 6% of hospital beds in the nation, have lost close to $1 billion by treating a disproportionate amount of MediCal and Medicaid patients compared to other healthcare providers like Kaiser Permanente. One reason for this disparity is UC health centers have an “open-door policy” for patients in need and take on many Medicaid patients, said David Lubarsky, vice chancellor of human health sciences and CEO for UC Davis Health. Kaiser, on the other hand, has the “ability to skim purely commercial patients out of the population,” he alleged. Another reason is that the UC health centers often serve as county hospitals, Tam said.

However, the HPRA is working to receive government funding to address these losses by communicating UC’s crucial role as a healthcare provider, Tam added. John Pérez, chair of the Regents’ Health Services Committee, thinks this issue warrants further discussion, he said. “We are, in fact, subsidizing, in practical terms, others,” Pérez said. “Yes, it is consistent with our public mission to serve the patients that we do, but public investment in healthcare ought to track with that public benefit and that public service.”

Regarding UCLA’s partnership with III, John Mazziotta, vice chancellor and CEO of UCLA Health, received approval from the Board to establish a long-term research affiliation with III to build an immunological research center on UCLA’s Health Sciences Campus. The facility will focus on theoretical immunology and clinical trials, and UCLA would receive a portion of III’s net revenue, Mazziotta said. Additionally, the state government intends to provide $500 million in funding for the research center’s construction, $200 million of which it has already provided, according to the H3 action item briefing. “I think this opportunity is a unique one that we’re quite excited about, not only here on campus at UCLA but throughout the University of California because of the collaborations it will establish,” Mazziotta said. “If its full potential is realized, it should lead to therapies and new strategies for the treatment of diseases worldwide.”

The committee also approved the addition of four categories to the UC Clinical Quality Dashboard, including Population Health and Adverse Events reported to regulatory agencies, as well as defined performance measures for the former. According to Robert Cherry, clinical quality committee chair, expanding collection of these metrics will ultimately help improve UC hospital rankings nationally and “drive enterprise-wide excellence.”

To conclude the meeting, Atul Butte, chief data scientist at UCH, delivered a periodic report on the work of the Center for Data-driven Insights and Innovation, including COVID-19 research efforts and a project to reduce inpatient pharmacy costs.

Source: https://www.dailycal.org/2023/08/10/regents-discuss-1-billion-loss-in-uc-academic-health-centers-status-of-other-health-services.

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*The following corrective email was sent to the reporter on Aug. 12:

Hello. In your description in the Daily Cal of the recent meeting of the Regents' Health Services Committee at

https://www.dailycal.org/2023/08/10/regents-discuss-1-billion-loss-in-uc-academic-health-centers-status-of-other-health-services

you state:

"Also present was a representative of the UCLA, UCSB and UCSF Emeriti Associations urging for a better UC retiree health plan."

I am the representative you describe. Please note that we are not in fact urging any improvement in the existing UC retiree health plan, i.e. "a better UC retiree health plan." What we want is that the current plan be administered as it is written. Under the plan, when former employees of UC die, their survivors (typically spouses) may be eligible for continued health plan coverage. Yet the grieving survivors are being incorrectly kicked off the plan and - in effect - made to fight their way back on to it. The improper interruption of health insurance, which can disrupt needed health care, puts great stress on elderly individuals who are already distressed by the death of the retiree. We simply want the UC Office of the President (UCOP) to instruct the insurance carriers not to cancel eligible survivors and to provide continued coverage as the plan already provides.

Perhaps, given the very limiting one-minute duration allowed for public comments, my remarks were not clear. However, more information on this matter can be found at the links below:

UCOP Needs to Make the Call to Protect Survivor Health Insurance

Part 8:

https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2023/08/ucop-needs-to-make-call-to-protect_9.html

Part 7:

https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2023/08/ucop-needs-to-make-call-to-protect.html

Part 6:

https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2023/07/ucop-needs-to-make-call-to-protect_20.html

Part 5:

https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2023/07/ucop-needs-to-make-call-to-protect.html

Part 4:

https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2023/06/ucop-needs-to-make-call-to-protect_30.html

Part 3: