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June 25, 2012— A 19-member, governor-appointed workgroup made up largely of hospital and insurance representatives has selected PacificSource’s small group plan as the state’s essential health benefits package.Governor Kitzhaber must either accept the recommendation, or ask that a different plan be chosen by September 30. Otherwise, the federal government will make that decision.

February 29, 2012—A workgroup charged with studying how doulas could be incorporated into the Oregon Health Plan told legislators earlier this week that doing so could help improve birth outcomes, particularly in minority communities. Last year, the Legislature passed House Bill 3311, which required the Oregon Health Authority to investigate how doulas and other community health workers could improve the birth outcomes of underprivileged and underserved women.

When Saxton made one of her first public appearances at Willamette University as the acting director of the Oregon Health Authority, she handed out a chart showing Oregon could save over $10 billion in Medicare expenditures over the next 10 years, but that was never the case. The chart should have said $10 billion in Medicaid savings over the next 10 year, and has since been corrected.