Advocacy Committee

Meghan Hope
Abilene Christian University

Byron Hunter
JPS Health Network

Rida Mahmood

Herron Mitchell, FACHE

Jennifer Moody
ECG Management Consultants

Aditi Nethikar

Maria Ocheja

Ajith Pai, FACHE
Texas Health/Harris Methodist Hospital

Tom Peck, L-FACHE
Tom Peck Communications

Isabel Perez
Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children

Karana Pierre
The Joint Commission

Bridgette Rees

Cristal Retana Lule
Children’s Health

Melinda Schmidt

Cassandra Self, FACHE
Texas Health Resources

Thai Vo
NTC Insurance Agency

Brittany Wall, DNP, RN, APRN
HCA Healthcare/Galen College of Nursing

Committee Responsibilities

Purpose: The goal of ACHENTX’s Advocacy Committee is to raise awareness with healthcare leaders about issues and use our collective voice to influence legislation that improve and save lives for the communities of North Texas.

KPI: establish priorities, legislative update/education event, engagement metric

Priorities:

• Expand coverage and access for uninsured Texans
• Reimbursement for Medicaid payments to hospitals and physicians at a fair and equitable amount
• Support Disproportionate Share (DSH) payments and Local Provider Participation Funds (LPPFs)
• Oppose site-neutral policies that unfairly penalize hospital outpatient departments
• Enhance faculty salaries, student scholarships and financial aid for workforce development with emphasis on rural communities
• Support behavioral health training and funding
• Strengthen prompt payment provisions
• Support and help develop meaningful price transparency for patients
• Continue value based virtual health to improve outcomes
• Protect consumers from harmful network disruptions by insurers after the consumers have preselected their benefit plans
• Support work place safety including advance notice for tracking individuals with monitoring devices related to previous crimes.
• Support policies and legislation that address documented health disparities in access, morbidity and mortality, particularly among racial/ethnic minority groups and those of lower socioeconomic status.
• Propose physician based priorities
• Establish DE&I priorities

To do:

• Introduce at board level
• Seek political expertise within our organization to enhance the committee
• Create info graphic for policy priorities
• Set up committee meeting structure and frequency
• Determine operating structure
• Plan legislative update during/post session