What a healthcare-for-all system could look like

In a five-part series provided by nonprofit, donor-funded Colorado Public News, investigative journalists examine how Grand Junction, Colo., has emerged as a model of low-cost, high-quality, near-universal healthcare.

• Part 1 details how healthcare professionals have built a system with an emphasis on primary care and prevention. Accompanying the stories are charts ranking more than 300 cities for cost and quality, and another chart detailing the differences in spending at the end of life in high- and low-cost cities.

• Part 2 highlights two key factors in the system, including hospice care and a clinic for the uninsured.

• Part 3 features a video on Grand Junction’s healthcare system, and a bullet-point breakdown of how the system is unusual. Additionally, KBDI Channel 12 in Denver aired a discussion and live call-in program focusing on the Grand Junction healthcare system (view the video on KBDI’s website).

• Part 4 explains how a simpler approach to healthcare can keep costs low in caring for back pain. A chart shows the dramatic difference in chronic disease in low-cost Grand Junction and high-cost McAllen, Texas.

• Part 5 explores whether the Grand Junction model can be replicated in other communities, and details where it finds savings.

View all published parts here.

This series was provided to the Los Angeles Times by Colorado Public News, an affiliate of Colorado Public Television. It was produced as a project for The California Endowment Health Journalism Fellowships, a program of USC’s Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism.