Health Care in California

Addressing the health care challenges facing California requires thoughtful, factual analysis. Recognizing this need, California Assembly Members Joe Nation (D-San Rafael) and Keith Richman, M.D. (R-Northridge) led a bipartisan effort to develop resources and programs for leaders at all levels and to promote constructive dialogue among leaders from all points of view. As part of that effort, RAND Health, a division of the RAND Corporation, joined with the Communications Institute to produce a series of conferences intended to give community leaders, policymakers, journalists, business executives, and government and labor officials a factual basis for discussion and decisionmaking. Presented at venues across the state, the conferences also drew on resources of the state’s major academic institutions including the University of California, Los Angeles; California State University, Fresno, Central Valley Health Policy Institute; the University of California, Berkeley, School of Public Health/ Center for Health Research; Stanford University Medical School; and the University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine. This chart book documents the factual core of these conferences. It should be of interest to both state and national leaders as they pursue innovative and sustainable approaches to improving the health care system.