PIPC supports new comparative effectiveness research proposal

Sep 17 2009

The Partnership to Improve Patient Care (PIPC), a non-partisan, patient- focused, grassroots organization focused on securing patient-centered comparative effectiveness research (CER) voiced its strong support of the comparative effectiveness research provisions in Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus’s health reform proposal released today.

“Patients and health care providers across the country can benefit from the strong, patient-centered approach to comparative effectiveness research that is included in this proposal,” PIPC Chairman and epilepsy patient Tony Coelho said. “Sen. Baucus’s measure creates an independent Institute governed by patients, providers, government officials and other stakeholders, and further strengthens safeguards to protect patient access to the treatment options they need. This provides a sound framework for independent, sustained, and objective research that is focused on the needs of patients.”

“By creating an independent research Institute and including significant patient safeguards, the CER provisions will ensure that relevant, credible data is available to patients and their healthcare providers, and help ensure that information is used to inform treatment options, not limit them,” Mr. Coelho said.

Sen. Baucus’s measure includes expanded patient safeguards including a focus on clinical effectiveness research, not cost-effectiveness; and provisions to ensure that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will not misuse CER results in ways that overlook differences in patient needs or discriminate against the elderly or people with disabilities.

“The most important stakeholder in the medical community is the patient,” Mr. Coelho said. “Sen. Baucus’s proposal puts patients at the center of comparative effectiveness research, providing assurance that research will be focused on improving patient care and not cutting costs by restricting access to treatment options.”

PIPC also supports similar legislation (H.R. 2502) that has been introduced in the House by Rep. Kurt Schrader and 18 cosponsors, and an amendment, proposed by Delegate Christensen, that is currently pending before the Energy and Commerce Committee.