Committee Basics

The GBC Health Care Committee reviews legislative matters that affect the health care and health care insurance industry; identifies issues and develops positions on health care that impact the residents in the region and that have implications for the business community. The committee communicates to legislators and key stakeholders, in coordination with the GBC President & CEO, the value of the health care industry to the region and the benefits of a healthy workforce and population. Meets every six weeks at 8 a.m. at the GBC.

How to join
Contact Lisbeth Pettengill at 410-727-2820, x41 or lisbethp@gbc.org.

Mission statement
The Greater Baltimore Committee Health Care Committee membership consists of representatives of GBC member companies who have expressed an interest in the work of the committee and have been invited to participate. The Health Care Committee's charge is to:

Act as an advisory group to the GBC President and Board of Directors regarding legislative matters that affect the health care and health insurance industry
Identify health care issues that impact residents in the region and the state of Maryland and which have implications for the business community and develop positions on them
Communicate with legislators and key stakeholders, in coordination with the GBC President and CEO, the value of the health care industry to the region and the benefits of a healthy workforce and population.

Activities for 2010

For 2010, the GBC Health Care Committee identified reducing the incidence of chronic disease in Maryland's workforce as its key issue. To this end, the committee has partnered with Lieutenant Governor Anthony Brown's Healthiest Maryland initiative. Healthiest Maryland is a statewide movement to create a culture of wellness - an environment that makes healthy choices, easy choices. Maria Prince, MD, MPH PPT Presentation

>>A key element of this initiative is business community engagement. The Lieutenant Governor set a goal of engaging 75 companies in a one year period to actively engage in the Healthiest Maryland initiative by doing the following things:

Take a baseline assessment to determine how "healthy" the company environment is
Choose one or more specific programs (from resources and examples provided by the Healthiest Maryland initiative) and implement them
Make a commitment to changing the company culture to one of wellness through both action and policy.
Take a second assessment one year later to get a sense of what progress has been made.

>>Through the GBC Health Care Committee, the GBC agreed to identify and enlist 75 companies from its membership, from both large and small businesses. As of February 1, 2010 the following actions steps have been completed:

17 GBC member companies have taken the baseline assessment as a beta test for the assessment
Dr. Maria Prince, Healthiest Maryland coordinator addressed the GBC Health Care Committee and is working with its members to enlist GBC companies
Ms. Fran Phillips, assistant secretary of the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene made a presentation to the GBC's President's Advisory Council to raise awareness about Healthiest Maryland and prepare companies to join the effort
Lieutenant Governor Anthony Brown addressed the GBC Board in January of 2010 to raise awareness and encourage companies to join
GBC staff and Health Care Committee members meet regularly with Healthiest Maryland coordinators to prepare materials for companies that may wish to join and to set up milestones for the initiative in terms of company involvement
GBC expects to have a kick-off of this effort in late May to begin enlisting companies and giving them access to resources for them to design their own wellness plans
Health Care Committee member Skip Counselman made a presentation at the Maryland Hospital Association to engage Maryland hospitals and their board companies in this effort.