Collaborative effort in Louisiana works to repair medical response | 08.09.2006 | 08:39:33 | Views: 5398 | ID: August 9 '06: A new collaborative effort is underway in Louisiana to repair and restructure the healthcare system to help medical officials and responders develop more flexible ways to handle disaster and emergency situations as well as surge capacity mitigation. The effort between state and local medical services in Louisiana and the Department of Health and Human Services is "working from the ground up ... to build an efficient 21st. century healthcare system implementing technology, transparency, emergency preparedness and greater personal healthcare choices." After Hurricane Katrina, the medical response infrastructure in New Orleans and the surrounding Gulf Coast areas was eighty percent destroyed. In July HHS Secretary Michael Leavitt signed a declaration that began to put mechanisms in motion to repair the healthcare system. In the language, HHS and the state and local governments in Louisiana will work in a collaborative effort "to develop and oversee the implementation of a practical blueprint for an evidence-based, quality driven health care system for Louisiana." That implementation would include three "core" principles: local solutions for emergency medical response; patient-centered care; and the ability for all residents of an area to receive medical care. In its charter, the collaborative said the destruction of New Orleans also provided "an unparalleled opportunity to design and implement fundamental change in the financing and delivery of health care in Louisiana."
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