The ACC held its 2009 Health System Reform Summit on February 1-2 in Washington, D.C. More than 125 health care professionals, policymakers, industry representatives, payers, and others gathered for two days to discuss the roles and responsibilities of health care providers and issues surrounding patient access to care, payment reform, and defining and measuring quality and value.

The 2009 Summit aimed to build on the key health care reform principles drafted by ACC's Blue Ribbon Panel and presented at the 2008 Summit. Since the first Summit, the ACC has worked to engage lawmakers, payers, and others around the principles and the concept that the role of physician specialty communities is to "transform health care from the inside out."

Participants at the 2009 Summit heard from: key congressional staff; California Health and Human Services Secretary Kimberly Belshe; Paul Wingle of the Massachusetts Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector; economist Len Nichols, Ph.D., director of the health policy program at the New America Foundation; Harvard Business School Professor and author Regina Herzlinger; Darren Willcox of the Coalition to Advance Health Care Reform; Bill Novelli, CEO of AARP; Helen Darling from the National Business Group on Health; Douglas Wood, M.D., F.A.C.C., of Mayo Clinic; Glenn Steele, president and CEO of Geisinger Health System; and Francois de Brantes, CEO of Bridges to Excellence. Participants also heard from ACC leadership, including Douglas Weaver, M.D., F.A.C.C., Alfred Bove, M.D., F.A.C.C., and Ralph Brindis, M.D., F.A.C.C.