Anna Eshoo: “I want to thank Mr. Obey for including $307 million for the Children's Graduate Medical Education Program. While this…”

“I want to thank Mr. Obey for including $307 million for the Children's Graduate Medical Education Program. While this amount is less than the $330 million authorized by Congress last year, it is obviously a good improvement over the levels proposed by the President, which is $110 million, and the Senate Appropriations Committee, which is $200 million. The reason I wanted to have the colloquy is to go on record, urge the chairman to do everything he can to not only maintain the House's funding level when the bill goes to conference, and perhaps even be able to do more. I think that we all have a healthy understanding of what the Children's Hospitals GME represents. It has been an outstanding success. It is important to note that Children's Hospitals receive 80 percent of what other teaching hospitals receive on average from Medicare's Graduate Medical Education Program. In recent years, Children's Hospitals have been able to sustain and improve their training programs so that the shortages of pediatric specialists in our country can be addressed.”