- http://www.wbur.org/2012/05/18/mass-senate-health-bill
- http://www.wbur.org/2012/05/23/mass-end-of-life
- http://www.wbur.org/2012/08/02/health-care-shopping
- http://www.wbur.org/2012/08/06/health-cost-bill
List date(s) this work was published or aired.
05.18.12 Senate Passes Health Care Cost Control Bill with Few Major Changes 05.23.12Mass Skirts End-of-Life Counseling Controversy 08.02.12 Trying to Find the Cost of a Medical Procedure? Good Luck 08.06.12 Patrick Signs Health Care Cost Containment Bill
Provide a brief synopsis of the story or stories, including any significant findings.
WBUR has led coverage of Massachusetts’ attempt to create a model for health care cost control. This effort began in 2011 with exclusive coverage of the first outline of a bill and several stories on key components, including the definition of a medical home and debate about where to set the state’s health care spending target. The package presented here includes two daily turn-arounds that illustrate our commitment to explaining this major, complex law in terms anyone can understand. We continued in 2012 to dig in on the hundreds of changes included in versions of a cost containment bill. To illustrate, we include our story on a new requirement that doctors offer end of life counseling to patients nearing death. This was an enterprising revelation that Massachusetts would move ahead with a version of the “death panels” that triggered heated national debate. And finally, we include one of many stories we produced that illustrate the gap between the goal of the law, “to give consumers transparency in health care,” and the reality of trying to find useful cost and quality information. My search for the price of an MRI gave me headaches that few patients will tolerate.
Explain types of documents, data or Internet resources used. Were FOI or public records act requests required? How did this affect the work?
We were given exclusive access to many early and supporting documents that framed the health care cost law because legislative, business, policy and health care leaders trust us. We were not denied access to anything we asked to see. We negotiated the timing of reports on the materials we were given, but nothing else.
Explain types of human sources used.
Good sourcing did and still does drive our coverage. We maintain trusted relationships with everyone from legislative aides who could lose their job if they upstage a boss to numerous hospital CEOs
Results:
We are continually told that our coverage influences legislative leaders, hospital and physician executives, employers and patient behavior. This is hard to quantify but is encouraging.
Follow-up (if any). Have you run a correction or clarification on the report or has anyone come forward to challenge its accuracy? If so, please explain.
We did not have to run corrections or clarifications for any of these stories and no one has challenged their accuracy.
Advice to other journalists planning a similar story or project.
These stories are built on: 1) doing our homework by reading many early versions of bills, studying the background research and reviewing the data 2) attendance at many hearings and presentations 3) maintaining key sources 4) remembering that the average reader is scared of health care policy stories