Health Care Reform

Introducing, improving, or expanding complex public policy requires specialized knowledge of both law and policy. Both disciplines are well-represented within UMass Medical School’s Commonwealth Medicine division, which is a health care consulting organization dedicated to serving underserved populations.

With our staff’s focused health care reform expertise, the Commonwealth Medicine division plays an essential role during the development, implementation, and ongoing maintenance of health care reform initiatives. Whether a reform is designed to expand coverage, improve quality, or contain costs, our team applies extensive policy and legal knowledge throughout the process of making the reform a success:

  • Analyzing current and proposed policies and programs
  • Analyzing financing structures and developing appropriate fiscal strategies for public agencies
  • Negotiating federal approvals, as well as amendments and waiver proposals
  • Developing a broad base of support
  • Improving quality and limiting costs without reducing access to health care
  • Creating effective financing structures for both public and private sector clients
  • Offering legal analyses of comprehensive health system reform plans and discrete reform policies

Our legal, policy, and finance teams — based in our Center for Health Law and Economics, our Center for Health Policy and Research, and our Center for Health Care Financing — also have specific expertise in public and private sector coverage options, delivery systems, and financing. Our knowledge and understanding covers design and implementation of all aspects of health policy reform:

  • Assistance with budgeting and tapping state and federal funding sources
  • Design, direction, and delivery of Medicaid-based reform efforts
  • Assistance with the complexities of long-term care policy, as well as relevant waivers and financing
  • Education of stakeholders regarding the critical role of mandates in reforming a state’s health care system
  • Design of employer and individual mandates tailored to individual states
  • Design and implementation of Medicaid and State Children's Health Insurance Programs waiver programs
  • Cost containment and quality improvement
  • Analysis of the impact of proposed reform initiatives on vulnerable populations