[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 125 (Tuesday, September 8, 2009)]
[House]
[Pages H9311-H9312]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           HEALTH CARE REFORM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Bartlett) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BARTLETT. Madam Speaker, I believe that we can all agree the 
health care reform proposals ignited debates in homes and workplaces 
all over the country. The intense interest in health care policy by so 
many Americans made this August district work period unusually 
exciting. My offices were busy taking phone calls, e-mails, and having 
people drop by voicing their concerns. This healthy health care debate 
has led many Americans to become involved in politics for the first 
time.
  Whenever we in Congress do something really important, we need to get 
outside the Beltway because that's where the great wisdom in our 
country lies. All of us in the Congress share three goals for health 
care reform legislation: We want to make health care insurance more 
affordable and accessible. We want to improve the quality of health 
care. We want to reduce the cost of health care. Where we disagree is 
how to accomplish these goals.
  I would like to share some of what I did and learned concerning 
health care over the recess period. As a scientist and engineer, I seek 
out the facts to guide my decisions. I also earned my master's and 
doctorate degrees in human physiology, the basic medical science.

                              {time}  2030

  This training led me to a 20-year career teaching anatomy and 
physiology to both medical and nursing students. That's why one of the 
things I did and that my staff did was to read the House leadership 
bill, H.R. 3200, and the amendments by three House committees.

[[Page H9312]]

  I'm very proud that so many of my constituents were also interested 
in learning what proposed health care reform bills would do and exactly 
what they say. That's why I posted on my Web site the House Majority 
Bill 3200 with information about the approved amendments.
  I also posted on my Web site an alternative bill that I support, H.R. 
3400, the Empowering Patients First Act, developed out of suggestions 
by my colleagues in the Republican Study Committee. For those 
constituents without computer access, I provided hard copies of these 
bills to eight libraries and my four district offices.
  Besides reading legislation, I also engaged in a lot of listening and 
dialogue. I visited with local doctors in my district to get their 
perspective about health care.
  At the recommendation of one of my constituents, Dr. John Vitarello, 
who is a cardiologist who practices at Frederick Memorial Hospital in 
my district, I toured the cardiac catherization ``cath'' labs at 
Washington Adventist Hospital on August 27. I was invited to tour the 
lab by Dr. Mark Turco, an interventional cardiologist. Dr. Turco is 
also a leader of the three-member physician team from Washington 
Adventist Hospital which volunteered to supervise and assist a joint 
training venture for physicians in Frederick Memorial Hospital so they 
could also perform innovative procedures in cath labs that shorten 
patients' recoveries and hospital stays compared to traditional 
surgical repairs.
  While I was there in scrubs and mask, I observed a procedure called 
an endograft. An endograft is an innovative procedure in this case used 
to repair an aneurysm in the patient's aorta.
  In the image-guided endovascular repair, a stent graft, a woven 
polyester tube with a metallic skeleton, was compressed inside a 
carrier catheter. While viewed on an x-ray monitor, the endograft was 
inserted through a small incision in the patient's groin and threaded 
through the catheter through arteries to the site of the aneurysm. The 
stent graft was then placed across the aneurysm and released. As the 
stent graft expanded, it gripped the normal arterial wall on both ends 
of the aneurysm, bypassing the bulge from the inside.
  As I observed this procedure, I marveled at both the advances of our 
medical research and technology as well as the dedication in caring for 
human lives represented by this joint venture between Frederick 
Memorial Hospital and Washington Adventist Hospital. This procedure 
cuts down the recovery time for patients as well as the time required 
for patients to be in the hospital.
  One of my greatest concerns about health care reform is that we don't 
curtail the innovations in health care that are invented predominantly 
here in the United States.
  There is also a lot of concern about competition in health care. 
Competition is important. Competition always does two things: It drives 
down costs and increases quality. However, there is also a lot of 
cooperation in medical care today. Here, I observed physicians at one 
hospital helping physicians at another local hospital to increase the 
availability, the competition, for innovative medical treatments that 
benefit patients with improved outcome and less time in the hospital.
  I am 83 years old. I have seen in my own career and life and that of 
my family that innovation in modern medicine, American style, moves at 
an astonishing speed. It is this innovation that has so improved the 
quality of our lives as well as extending the lifespans of Americans.
  By far, the most enlightening and informative exercise was three 
nights of teletownhalls that I held during the break. On two nights, 
Dr. John Vitarello joined me as a guest for these townhall meetings. 
Over 180,000 telephone calls were placed; almost 20,000 people were 
home and listened to some part of the townhall.
  Madam Speaker, I believe that the prescription for health care reform 
in the present bill will make it worse and more expensive. These 
changes are the opposite of what we need and Americans want.

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