Nygren receives WHA 2015 Health Care Advocate award

MADISON (April 29, 2015) —- State Rep. John Nygren (R-Marinette) received the Wisconsin Hospital Association (WHA) Health Care Advocate of the Year Award April 28 at WHA’s Advocacy Day event in Madison. WHA Immediate Past Board Chair Ed Harding, President/CEO of Bay Area Medical Center in Marinette, presented this year’s award to Nygren in recognition of his collaborative efforts with hospitals and health care systems on several key issues.

Harding commended Nygren on his work to curb opiate and heroin abuse in Wisconsin by authoring and championing the bipartisan Heroin and Opiate Prevention and Education (HOPE) agenda. Harding noted that this legislative package has propelled a necessary statewide conversation about the impact opiate and heroin addiction have on Wisconsin families and communities. Harding also praised Nygren’s common sense approach to issues that impact hospitals and health systems in the marketplace and in the Wisconsin Worker’s Compensation program.

“John has been a long-standing partner with WHA,” said Harding. Harding said Nygren’s positions have helped protect the ability of hospitals and health systems to deliver high-quality, high-value health care in their local communities. Nygren has also been very supportive of WHA’s physician workforce agenda, demonstrated by his efforts to strengthen a provision in the last budget that expanded opportunities for physicians to complete post-graduate training in Wisconsin. This initiative has resulted in the creation of 60 new residency slots in more than 20 Wisconsin counties.

“Representative Nygren has not only been our partner, but he has been a champion on several of WHA’s priority issues,” according to WHA President/CEO Eric Borgerding. “John led the effort to reauthorize the Disproportionate Share Hospital program in the last budget, which provides critical funding to nearly a hundred hospitals across Wisconsin that serve as the health care safety net in their communities.”

Nygren represents Wisconsin’s 89th Assembly District, which includes portions of Marinette, Oconto and Brown counties. First elected in 2006, he is serving his fifth term in the Wisconsin State Assembly and his second term as the Assembly co-chair of the powerful budget-writing Joint Finance Committee.