After a six-month planning period, SHD's new project What Matters Most has been approved for funding by the California HealthCare Foundation. This project will explore in detail what SHD has heard from thousands of Californians in the past nine years: that some healthcare services are very important for insurance coverage and some are less important. Starting in November, What Matters Most will begin with a phone survey with 1,000 Californians conducted by Field Research Corporation.

Discussion groups will be held in early 2009 in different regions of the state to elicit citizens' perspectives on the results of the survey. This project is being assisted by an inter-organizational advisory committee and research consultants:

Advisory committee

• Tony Barrueta, Liaison Gov't Affairs, Kaiser Permanente Health Plan
• Hattie Hanley, MPP, Health Policy Advisor, Calif Dept of Managed Health Care
• Nettie Hoge, Office of the Lieutenant Governor
• ST Mayer, Health Policy and Planning, San Mateo County Dept of Health
• Kamal Muilenberg, MBA, Business Healthcare Connection, San Diego
• Susan Mulloy, RN, MS, CCM, Nurse Consultant, Calif Dept Health Care Services
• David J. Ormerod, MD, Medical Management/Operations, Blue Shield of Calif
• Brenda Premo, Director, Center for Disability Issues and the Health Professions
• Maureen McKennan Strumpfer, Staff Counsel, Calif Dept of Managed Health Care
• Ellen Wu, Executive Director, California Pan-Ethnic Health Network

Research consultants

• Rich Kravitz, MD and Dan Tancredi, PhD, UC Davis Center for Health Policy and Research
• Jack Fowler, PhD, Center for Survey Research, University of Massachusetts
• Linda Bergthold, PhD, Health Policy Consultant
• Marthe Gold, MD, Department of Community Health and Social Medicine, CUNY