In a town where hospitals are the top two employers, health care reform isn't just another policy up for debate in Washington it's a way of life. From a rally at a Sioux Falls park to a panel discussion with members of South Dakota's Congressional delegation, health care reform was on the minds of many Tuesday.
 
More than 12 thousand people in Sioux Falls work in the health care industry, and with President Barack Obama looking to pass a comprehensive health care reform plan before the end of the year the debate is already heating up.

President Obama's mission for health care reform is to provide, 'high-quality, affordable health care for all Americans.' Tuesday, Democrats and Republicans talked about what a plan like that would mean for patients and doctors in South Dakota. 

"What we're considering right now in the United States is one of the biggest changes to the way the country functions in my lifetime," Sioux Falls Orthopedic Surgeon Dr. Blake Curd said.

Sioux Falls Orthopedic Surgeon and state Republican Representative Blake Curd talked at a rally in Sioux Falls Tuesday night aimed at speaking out against a nationalized health care reform package.

"Will we be able to choose the doctor we want? Will we be able to choose the procedure we want? Will we be able to choose the kind of care that we want?" Dr. Curd said.

At a hearing earlier Tuesday Representative Stephanie Herseth Sandlin said a nationalized health care plan is not what Congress is considering. 

"When we say nationalized health care, or universal health care, or socialized medicine people think of one big government run program and that's not on the table. I don't support that, President Obama doesn't support that, and I don't think that has any ability to get any bipartisan support in the Congress," Representative Stephanie Herseth Sandlin said.

Herseth Sandlin says she is looking at a plan that would give patients a choice between public and private health care options.

"That's why I think it's important to structure it appropriately but at the same time have some mechanism to keep the private insurance plans competitive and responsible and be able to bend the cost curve going forward," Herseth Sandlin said.

But Curd sees that as creating classes of health care. 

"So, you may set up a system where your grandma gets one kind of doctor and the businessman gets another kind of doctor," Curd said.

Representative Herseth Sandlin said if Congress doesn't fix the current system one in every five dollars federally will be spent on health care.

Critics that spoke at Tuesday night's rally in Sioux Falls said Obama's plan will require tax hikes which would destroy the economy.