Remarks by HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson at Press Conference

Announcing Reforming Medicare and Medicaid Agency

Thank you for joining us here today for this very important announcement that will benefit millions of Americans.

We are announcing the first of what will be a series of reforms at the agency that runs Medicare and Medicaid, to make it more responsive to the patients and providers it serves.

And I'd like to welcome Tom Scully and Jane Baumgartner of the AARP. Thank you for coming.

Today, we're announcing a new name for HCFA, but more importantly we're creating a new culture of responsiveness. We're renewing our efforts to reach out to patients and providers who depend on and work with the agency. Not only that, we will work with Congress to pursue Medicare contracting reform legislation.

To give the agency a new direction, a new spirit, it is necessary that we give it a new name - one that truly reflects the agency's vital mission to serve millions of Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries across America.

Therefore, we are changing the name to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.

As part of the renaming, we will reorganize the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services around three centers to clearly reflect what precisely it does and how it serves millions of Americans:

• The Center for Beneficiary Choices will focus on the Medicare+Choice program and provide beneficiaries with information they need to make the best choice possible in choosing care.
• The Center for Medicare Management will focus on the traditional fee-for-service Medicare program.
  
  
• And the Center for Medicaid and State Operations will focus on programs administered by the states, including Medicaid, SCHIP and insurance regulation

But we are not just changing the name. We are changing the way we do business.

Since I arrived in Washington four months ago, I have spent a lot of time focusing on how this agency works -- what it does well, how it can be improved. I even spent a week in Baltimore, working at its headquarters.

I discovered that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has thousands of employees who are highly professional and dedicated to their jobs and the people they serve.

Today, I am asking each of the employees to join me in ensuring that the agency is more consumer-oriented, more responsive to the needs of everyone they deal with -- the beneficiaries, the providers, the states.

Among the changes to make the agency more consumer-friendly, we will:

• Name a Medicaid/SCHIP contact for each state at our regional and main offices to help breakthrough any bureaucratic bottlenecks at the agency. Each state will have one person they deal with -- and build a very close relationship.
• Similarly, we will select senior staff members to serve as primary contacts for beneficiary groups, plans, physicians, provider and suppliers.
• We also will find better ways to resolve problems and increase training, as well as respond to Congress and other groups more promptly.

The changes will be for naught, however, if we can't reach the people we are here to serve -- the beneficiaries -- to ensure they understand what services are available to them.

Too many of the people I have met around the country as secretary and as governor tell me they don't understand what services are available to them.

Medicare. Medigap, Medicare Select. Medicare+Choice. That's a lot to swallow. We need to do a better job of explaining what all of these programs are and help people become more informed in making their health care decisions.

During the open enrollment period, we will launch a major media campaign to highlight the health care options and resources available to Medicare clients. The campaign will begin this fall, and will be one of our most important tools in reaching beneficiaries.

We also will make the 1-800-MEDICARE telephone line available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, beginning this fall, so callers can receive comprehensive information about health plan options available in their area.

We will improve the Medicare Web site to help Medicare beneficiaries compare benefits, costs, options and quality of providers. And we will propose grants to public libraries and train librarians to assist seniors in obtaining information about Medicare options and costs.

Finally, we will pursue Medicare contracting reform legislation ... to reduce the number of private health insurance companies that process claims and provide other administrative services from about 50 today to fewer than 20 by 2006. Work should be awarded competitively, using performance-based contracts that will allow us to improve service to beneficiaries and providers. The goal is to provide the highest quality care to our beneficiaries.

I will work with each of the members of Congress to ensure this is done as efficiently as possible.

We have laid out an ambitious proposal today, one that is crucial to the future effectiveness of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. We must not be beholden to the status quo, the old way of doing things. We must always be willing to change.

Our new name certainly reflects a new attitude and a more apt description of what the agency does -- administer Medicare and Medicaid. But perhaps the most important word in the new name is the last one: services.

We are here to serve. We provide essential services to millions of health care consumers and the health care providers that serve them. And beginning today, we are going to provide these services at a level of excellence that Americans deserve.

And this is just a beginning. We are going to continue to strengthen and modernize the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services as long as I'm here. Our commitment to excellence is unwavering.

Thank you very much.

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Note: All HHS press releases, fact sheets and other press materials are available at http://www.hhs.gov/news.