We've heard from insurers, businesses, politicians, think tanks, concerned citizens, and many other groups interested in health care reform. This week, a new paper from the Center for American Progress focuses on ensuring that the professionals who actually provide care have their voices heard in the debate.

In Health Reform: Delivering for Those Who Deliver Health Care, co-authors Robert A. Berenson and CAP Associate Director of Health Policy Ellen-Marie Whelan argue that health care professionals have an essential role to play in the health reform debate, and their active engagment can help produce a better system for both patients and clinicians.

Berenson and Whelan outline five core elements that are present in emerging health care reform legislation. The combination of these elements will help transform the health care system in a way that allows health care providers to better serve their patients.

• Insurance coverage expansion. Providing all Americans with health coverage is a first priority. This can be accomplished though building on the current mixed public/private system, eliminating exclusions based on pre-existing conditions, and reforming the payment system to increase transparency and reduce waste. (As we've discussed before, a public plan and a private plan can coexist peacefully if the rules governing their fair competition are constructed properly).
• Delivery system reform and payment innovation. Berenson and Whelan call for the use of integrated delivery systems, in which physicians play an important leadership role to promote collaborative team-based care, promote the adoption and advancement of electronic health records and HIT, and enhance patient safety. In the past, we've examined the Baylor Health Care System's successful implementation of an integrated delivery system, the Best Care Committee, their use of physician champions, and the lessons learned from the experience.
• Prevention and wellness. Reform will enhance public health programs and enable caregivers to encourage preventive care and healthy lifestyles on both an individual and community level. Such programs can be a crucial bridge to addressing the social determinants of health.
• Chronic care management. Coordinated care management will decrease waste and confusion in the health care delivery system and allow clinicians to more efficiently manage patients' conditions. For more on the right ways to do chronic disease management, check out Berenson's insightful post here.
• Comparative effectiveness. Comparative effectiveness research will allow clinicians and patients to make informed, evidence-based choices. Clinicians already rely on evidence from peer-reviewed journals and studies to improve their practice and make the best decisions for their patients—comparative effectiveness research will help by creating a coordinated standard of comparison for research, ensuring that care givers are getting the best, most accurate information possible.

Berenson and Whelan conclude:

With active support by all stakeholders, and especially those who have devoted their lives to improving our nation's health, our country can actually achieve the twin goals of universal coverage and delivery system reform that produces much greater value for patients, and a better and fairer deal for the health professionals who have struggled to provide excellent health care in the face of major obstacles. Today, health professionals, physicians, nurses, physician assistants, therapists, dentists, chiropractors, and many other dedicated individuals are where they deserve to be: at the forefront of efforts to achieve these goals.