Our Resolutions for 2018

“And now we welcome the new year. Full of things that have never been.” – Rainer Maria Rilke

Many of us start the new year with high expectations – mainly of ourselves. We make resolutions to lose weight, do yoga every morning, to better meet deadlines. This is a time for self-reflection, for taking stock of our past year and for looking forward. Here at the Bree Collaborative – we have high expectations of what you should expect from your health care system. We also have high expectations of how we can help build a better health care system.

For 2018 we resolve to double down on our triple goals of better quality, outcomes, and affordability for everyone in Washington State. We started convening our LGBTQ Health Care workgroup in December and will continue to meet throughout 2018 – join us on January 3rd. Our Collaborative Care for Chronic Pain and Re-Review of the Lumbar Fusion Bundled Payment Model and Warranty will have their first meetings on January 12th and 23rd. Our Opioid Guideline Prescribing Implementation workgroup will meet on January 31st to continue development of evidence-based standards for perioperative opioid prescribing. We will also convene our workgroup on suicide prevention.

We resolve to regularly communicate with our stakeholders through these blogs, newsletters, and social media and be as open and transparent as possible. You can always see what we are up to and join us at a meeting – information here.

We also resolve to focus on implementing our recommendations into clinical care. We are developing surveys of our recommendations completed in 2017 – they will all be available here. We will continue to work with our partners across the state – including the Health Care Authority and other state agencies, employers, Accountable Communities of Health, health plans, hospitals, medical groups, professional associations, and others – on implementation.

If you are in Seattle you can begin 2018 with a polar bear plunge into Lake Washington.  Cheers to the new year – whether you begin 2018 icy, bundled up next to a fire, or working on a healthier you and a healthier Washington State.

Ginny Weir, MPH
Program Director, Bree Collaborative