[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 14]
[House]
[Page 19562]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        HEALTH REFORM INITIATIVE

  (Mr. SARBANES asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. SARBANES. Mr. Speaker, I wanted to just take a moment and speak 
about two very important elements in the health reform initiative that 
we are considering in the House. Both of these are things that will 
help to strengthen the relationship between the physician and the 
patient.
  The first is something called medical-loss ratio. That's a technical 
term, but it basically means how much does that insurance company use 
of the premium you give them to actually spend on medical care. If they 
don't spend at least 85 cents on the dollar, it means they're not 
giving the kind of care to the patient that they deserve.
  The second important thing is the investment in preventive care that 
we're going to make in this bill so that a physician can spend more 
time with the patient. There are elderly patients all across the 
country who wish that their physician could spend a little bit more 
time with them to really understand their situation. We don't reimburse 
for that right now. But going forward, we can do that, and that will 
promote the relationship between the physician and their patient and 
lead to overall better care for that patient and a better relationship 
with that patient's family.

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