Colorado Nurses for Access to Health Care for All (CNAHCA).

The Colorado Nurses for Access to Health Care for All committee (CNAHCA) of the Colorado Nurses Association meets monthly. This committee is a passionate group of nurses who are interested in improving access to health care in Colorado.

The function of CNAHCA is to follow health care reform projects and state legislative bills, which affect nursing and access to health care in Colorado. Currently, there is a lot of interest in looking for ways to control costs and improve access to health care in the state and the nation. This year at the Colorado Legislature, there were a number of bills that concerned access to health care in our state. Our review of bills and policies was in light of the impact on nursing and access to needed health care in all areas of the state but also to assist CNA's Policy Director and Lobbyist in consideration of alignment with CNA's goals and principles.

The bills this year covered many different viewpoints on our current health care system and the proposed changes from the Federal Affordable Care Act. Again, CNAHCA focus was on access to health care. CNAHCA takes a more global look at the health care system. Bills are prioritized into four categories: active support, passive support, monitors, and informational only. CNA Policy Director makes all final decisions as to the level of involvement with active bills. Committee members will then follow the legislative process. When appropriate and needed, the lobbyist, members of the committee and other knowledgeable members may attend the hearings and testify consistent with CNA's position on the matter.

CNA House of Delegates established the CNAHCA committee in 2008. Since the inception of the committee, the landscape of health care and reform measures has changed a great deal and possibly in ways the committee never imagined in 2008. This brought us to the conclusion that it was time to update our guiding principles. A workshop and strategic planning meeting was held on March 23 to achieve group consensus on the committee principles. The group reviewed not only ANA's position statements on health care reform but also the IOM report on the Future of Nursing and other position statement papers to create a document of guiding principles related to health care system design to be used to assess future work by the committee and CNA in health care system reform. We are looking forward to getting the updated principles approved by the CNA Board of Directors.

CNAHCA encourages all nurses to obtain as much information about the many changes that are occurring or proposed changes to the health care system. There are a number of ways to become involved with the committee: offer your input and advice to the committee, visit committee meetings, attend other advocacy groups on health care reform and share the information with others, or attend legislative committee hearings.

If you are interested in committee activities or participating in the CNAHCA committee, please visit the CNA website or feel free to contact Brenda VonStar (Chair of CNAHCA) by phone [phone] or email [e-mail].

Submitted by: Brenda Vonstar RN, FNPC