GRAND JUNCTION, COLO. — At first glance, this city of 45,000 looks like so many others, a spiral of ranch homes, shopping centers and chain stores.
But to healthcare reformers, Grand Junction, Colo., is the land of innovation -- a place that provides high-quality healthcare at a fraction of the regular price.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Tuesday, August 18, 2009 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 4 National Desk 1 inches; 26 words Type of Material: Correction
Healthcare in Grand Junction: An article in Friday's Section A about low health costs in Grand Junction, Colo., referred to Dartmouth University researchers. It's Dartmouth College.
The local HMO offers prenatal care to all women in the county. Doctors evaluate themselves partly on the cost-effectiveness of treatments they prescribe. Nurses often check on patients home from the hospital to help prevent relapses.
With President Obama set to hold a town hall here Saturday, many experts hope Grand Junction will offer lessons to the rest of the country.
"It's a great example for the nation," said Len Nichols, a healthcare economist at the centrist New America Foundation in Washington, D.C., who co-wrote a paper released this week on the area's record. "They have managed to contain the natural impulses of excessive competition and the medical arms race. . . . Everybody's looking into this."
According to Dartmouth University researchers, Grand Junction's cost of $5,873 per Medicare patient in 2006, the most recent data available, is about 30% below the national average. By contrast, the cost per patient in Los Angeles is $10,810.
Grand Junction, the researchers found, is the sixth-cheapest community in the nation, with Honolulu registering as the most cost-effective and Miami the most expensive.
Depending on the point of view, Grand Junction embodies some of the principles outlined by Obama in his bid to rein in healthcare costs -- such as promoting preventive care -- or shows what can be done without government intervention.
Unlike in most communities, where doctors are paid less for Medicaid patients than insured ones, physicians here agreed among themselves to charge a little less for regular patients and a little more for Medicaid patients. That way doctors would be happy to treat all comers.
"In effect, we created a community health system," said Steve ErkenBrack, president of Rocky Mountain Health Plans.
Some locals are skeptical of all the attention. Dr. James Schroeder, a pediatric cardiologist, wrote a column in the Grand Junction Free Press criticizing the focus on the city as low-cost medical paradise.
Schroeder argued that the emphasis on the efficiency pointed to a narrow-minded way of evaluating healthcare that he feared the president was pushing on the nation.
