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HARTFORDBUSINESS.COM | MARCH 20, 2023 27 FOCUS: HEALTH CARE Office of Health Strategy Executive Director Deidre Gifford in her Hartford office. HBJ PHOTO | STEVE LASCHEVER Bending The Curve Lamont's top healthcare advisor Gifford leads efforts to rein in escalating costs By Robert Storace rstorace@hartfordbusiness.com W hen Gov. Ned Lamont seeks out advice on healthcare issues he turns to a number of advisors, but none arguably more important than Deidre Gifford. The 64-year-old Cornell Medical College graduate is the governor's senior advisor on healthcare policy and also runs the Office of Health Strategy, an agency with several functions like overseeing industry mergers and acquisitions — including Yale New Haven Health's pending purchase of Manchester Memorial, Rockville General and Waterbury hospitals. Gifford also helped lead the state's COVID-19 response when she was named interim public health commis- sioner at the pandemic's start. With the COVID crisis now under better control, Gifford is spearheading the Lamont administration's efforts to attack another symptom ailing the healthcare industry: escalating costs. Lamont this legislative session has proposed multiple bills aimed at reducing healthcare costs and improving care quality and access. Policies range from eliminating certain hospital facility fees to reining in aggressive pharmaceu- tical company marketing practices and restricting anti-competitive contracting practices employed by providers. They would impact all major facets of the industry from insurers and hospitals to pharmaceutical companies, and are in response to a confluence of factors driving up healthcare costs for consumers and businesses. Gifford said hospital inpatient and outpatient costs and pharmaceutical prices are the largest drivers of the state's healthcare affordability problem, but she's cautious not to lay blame on any single stakeholder. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, Connecticut spends approximately $12,500 per person on health care, about $2,300 more than the national average. Coming into the year, Connecticut individual consumers and busi- nesses faced average insurance premium rate increases of 12.9% and 7.9%, respectively. "I have said many times, as has the governor, that this is a problem that everyone has to work together to solve," Gifford said in a recent interview with the Hartford Busi- ness Journal. "We are trying not to vilify any particular party because all parties make a contribution to our healthcare system and have a responsibility to be part of the solution." Anti-competitive practices Efforts to reform the healthcare system won't be easy; there are no silver-bullet solutions and it requires buy-in from diverse stakeholders with, at times, competing interests. Even issues that seem like they have a straightforward cause and effect are complicated. For example, in announcing the Lamont administration's proposals, Gifford said health system consolidation and lack of compe- tition are contributing to higher healthcare costs. There seems to be growing consensus around that thinking, with a recently published study by Harvard Medical School and the National Bureau of Economic Research concluding that consoli- dated health systems offer patients "marginally better care at signifi- cantly higher costs." Connecticut has experienced significant hospital consolidation with two major systems — Yale New Haven Health and Hartford HealthCare — now controlling about two-thirds of all statewide hospital net patient revenue. At the same time, Connecticut hospitals earlier this month sounded the alarm on post-pandemic finan- cial strains, issuing a report that shows they lost a collective $164 million in fiscal 2022, spurred by shrinking revenues, sicker patients and surging labor and other costs. DEIDRE GIFFORD Executive Director Office of Health Strategy Education: University of Cali- fornia at Los Angeles; medical degree, Cornell University Medical College in New York Age: 64