19 Nov BPC Action Urges Congress to Fully Reauthorize the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) in Health

BPC Action urges Congress to fully reauthorize the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI).

BPC Action applauds Sens. Warner (D-VA), Cassidy (R-LA), Van Hollen (D-MD), and Capito (R-WV) for the introduction of the PCORI Reauthorization Act, which aligns with long-time BPC recommendations. We now encourage Congress to move quickly to fully reauthorize PCORI, including the current all-payer funding structure, to ensure that this critical organization is able to fund new comparative effectiveness research in FY20 to continue to promote patient access to evidence-based treatments and high-value care.

Congress is set to pass another short-term CR to fund the government through December 20, which includes an extension for the PCORI Trust Fund. Unfortunately, it does not also extend PCORI’s funding mechanisms, which, without further congressional action, puts in jeopardy PCORI’s ability to support new research in the coming year.

PCORI is an independent, non-profit organization with a mission to provide patients and providers with information to make decisions that improve health outcomes. At a time when we are all working to improve the quality and value of health care, PCORI’s mission is more important than ever. PCORI funds and disseminates clinical comparative effectiveness research studies that compare health care options to learn which works best given a patient’s circumstances and preferences. PCORI’s research is unique among funders. It requires that patients and other stakeholders be engaged in the studies it supports from the start and remain involved all the way through the dissemination of results. This makes it more likely that PCORI-funded studies will get the research questions right and that the results will be placed into clinical practice more quickly.

BPC Action urges Congress to act quickly to provide a full, long-term reauthorization of PCORI and the necessary funding streams or, if required to do another short-term extension, to fully reauthorize both the PCORI Trust Fund and the funding streams to ensure that PCORI can continue funding new research in FY20.