MU Health Care and Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield are back in business. Now that they have a deal in principle, about 90,000 patients have had their coverage restored – and Missouri Senate President Pro-Tem Cindy O’Laughlin is getting a great deal of credit for pressuring both sides to go back to the negotiating table.

After contract negotiations collapsed for months, O’Laughlin held a public hearing on June 30. She didn’t waste any time. O’Laughlin said the day after the hearing, she picked up the phone and called both companies.

“Sometimes you win if you just are relentless and I am relentless,” O’Laughlin told Missourinet. “I knew that people were hurting and really needed this to be resolved.”

But neither side was budging. So last week, she gave Anthem and MU two days to make a deal.

“Sometimes I put things on social media that are kind of an eye opener for anyone reading it. But truthfully, I do that on purpose at times because I want to, if nothing else, shock people into movement,” said O’Laughlin. “Because if you try to talk to people and you can’t get people to move, you are kind of left with, ‘Okay what now?’ And I thought that’s where we were.”

She said the two-day deadline was given because Anthem was going to pull its offer and start negotiations from scratch, which could have delayed in-network coverage for several more months.

“I just felt that people couldn’t wait that long,” said O’Laughlin. “Companies don’t want to lose money and can’t afford to lose a lot of money, but on the other hand, this is a product that’s already been purchased. If nothing else, morally they’re obligated to find an answer, and we are morally obligated to encourage them to do that in the strongest sense.”

O’Laughlin said an exemption for patients with certain health conditions to continue to receive in-network care with their specialist did not work well for the patients. She mentioned one person with cancer and a child with heart problems who lost in-network coverage with their regular doctor during the contract spat.

“And I thought that was terribly wrong,” she said.

O’Laughlin said both sides knew it was in their best interest to keep a decent relationship with the legislature.

“I looked into other states. Had they had things like this happen? What did they do? Some of them passed additional regulation, fines if something like this happens. I mentioned that. I think for most companies, the thing they don’t want is for us to be in the middle of everything they do. And I’m totally with them on that. So don’t make us get in the middle of it,” said O’Laughlin.

She acknowledges that she does not have the authority to make them resolve their dispute, but did she threaten to pull university funding?

“Not in that many words, but of course they understand that. Funding is, you know, a priority for any academic institution,” she said. “And so, they knew that it was in their best interest to try to get this figured out.”

Her pressure did end up going all the way up the flagpole.

“Through a series of conversations, you know, what ultimately ended up that the main person from Anthem, who is in Georgia, and President (Mun) Choi ultimately, they are the two people who got together and made an agreement. And sometimes I think you just need the right two people,” said O’Laughlin.

She praised Anthem’s leader, Choi, Gov. Mike Kehoe, and Sen. Sandy Crawford for their work on trying to resolve the differences.

What’s in the agreement?

“For one thing, you can get into your doctor, so that has been taken care of. I think that both are committed to finding a way to protect the insured, which is what I think they should do. I don’t have the numbers but they both assured me that they are looking at those things and they’ll find a way to get it done. And I believe they will.”

The agreement in principle covers Anthem’s commercial health plan members, including self-funded and fully insured employer-sponsored plans and Affordable Care Act marketplace plans in central Missouri.

It will not include Anthem’s Medicare Advantage HMO and PPO plans.

The deal is retroactively effective April 1.

A contract is expected to be finalized within one to two weeks.

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