[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 141 (Monday, October 3, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: October 3, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                 TRIBUTE TO MONROE E. TROUT, M.D., J.D.

                                 ______


                          HON. GEORGE W. GEKAS

                            of pennsylvania

                    in the house of representatives

                        Monday, October 3, 1994

  Mr. GEKAS. Mr. Speaker, I would like the Congress to pay special 
tribute today to Monroe E. Trout, M.D., J.D., an outstanding American. 
Although he is retiring as chairman of the board, president and chief 
executive officer of American Healthcare Systems [AmHS], I hope that 
our recognition of his career will encourage his continued 
participation in the Nation's health affairs and will inspire young 
people to pursue similar interests.
  I rise to this occasion not only because I am well familiar with Dr. 
Trout's success as an adult, but also because he and I spent our 
childhood in the same city of Harrisburg and in the same neighborhood 
of that wonderful city. We grew up together, played together, and 
together developed our commitment to values and achievement that have 
led Monroe to the status of the renowned.
  Dr. Trout's history reads like an American odyssey. One of 13 
children, he worked his way through school with the goal of becoming a 
private practitioner of medicine. An exceptional student, he received 
scholarships, and in 1957 graduated from the University of Pennsylvania 
Medical School. His career has spanned more than four decades, 
beginning with a medical residency at Portsmouth Naval Hospital and 
appointment as a regimental surgeon in the U.S. Navy. Subsequently, Dr. 
Trout served as chief of the EKG and medical department at Harrisburg 
State Hospital and as a lecturer in legal medicine at the Dickinson 
School of Law, where he later earned his law degree.
  As a physician and an attorney, Dr. Trout has made notable 
contributions to the American health care system. He has been praised 
by the medical and business communities, the health care industry, and 
educational institutions on the local, regional, national, and 
international levels. In 1964, Dr. Trout left the private practice of 
medicine to work in the pharmaceutical industry, where he held 
leadership positions. He believed that through participation in major 
pharmaceutical research efforts he could contribute to the well-being 
of many more individuals.
  In recent years, Dr. Trout has extended his scope of activity through 
his leadership of AmHS, one the Nation's largest multihospital system 
alliances which has as its central goal the increased effectiveness of 
hospital systems. AmHS develops outstanding services and products at 
the lowest cost, consistent with high quality. The result has been a 
contribution to affordable health care for an ever-increasing number of 
consumers.
  As chief executive officer of AmHS, Dr. Trout has played a prominent 
role in health care reform, working with hospital systems and their 
officials in developing patients first, a comprehensive proposal to 
restructure the American health care delivery system. Patients first 
was the basis for the American Consumers' Health Care Reform Act which 
I introduced in 1993. Many of the ideas in patients first were also 
incorporated in other major health care reform bills.
  Consistent with his interest in improving the Nation's health care 
system, Dr. Trout has spearheaded the creation of an annual award--the 
AmHS Cares Award--which honors innovative programs nationality that 
improve access to health care for the medically underserved.
  An advocate of bipartisan approaches to health care reform, Dr. Trout 
has met with many Members of Congress, both Republicans and Democrats, 
to urge market-based community reform that would benefit a majority of 
Americans. He believes that forces in the health care marketplace can 
provide the best answers to control over health care costs. He served 
on the Health Issues Task Force in the 1988 Bush Presidential campaign 
and on the National Healthcare Coalition for Bush for President in 
1992, as well as many other advisory bodies, in both the private and 
public sectors.
  Philanthropy is high on Dr. Trout's agenda. He sits on numerous 
boards and committees, including the Youth Access to Alcohol Policy 
Panel. He has served as cochair of the San Diego County Commission on 
Health Care Reforms and is on the board of the Leon Williams 
Foundation, a San Diego organization formed to help youths to live 
constructively and contribute to the American dream of a society based 
on equality and justice.
  Dr. Trout believes strongly in supporting the education of health 
care providers who will serve generations to come. Through contacts in 
the biomedical community, he has been instrumental in providing 
scholarships to worthy students. He has personally funded scholarships 
at two universities and endowed a chair in pharmacology at the 
University of California, San Diego. In addition, he is chairman of the 
board of trustees of the University of California Foundation, San 
Diego, and serves on the University's California business-higher 
education forum board and its Connect Steering Committee.
  Mr. Speaker, on the occasion of his retirement from AmHS, Monroe 
Trout is deserving of special public recognition of his many 
accomplishments and service to American medicine and to our Nation's 
health care system. Today, I take great pleasure in saluting his 
outstanding contributions.

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