Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday she wouldn’t rule out keeping the House in session for part of Christmas week, if that could lead to final action this year on a health care overhaul.

Right now, however, such a scenario appears unlikely. The Senate is marking time on its version of the health legislation while Democratic leaders wait for a Congressional Budget Office analysis of their latest batch of proposals — a report not expected before next week.

Asked at a news conference if Congress could complete work on the health package in the next week to 10 days, Pelosi said there is a big difference between those two time frames. If the Senate passes its bill by the end of next week, she said House and Senate conferees could meet over the weekend of Dec. 19-20 to try to resolve differences between the two versions. That might allow final votes in the House and Senate before Christmas, she said.

“We would do almost anything if it would be possible” to enact President Obama’s top domestic policy priority this year, Pelosi said.

Even if final votes slip over into the new year, she said, Democrats will move quickly in 2010 to finish work on the bill. “Maybe we can’t [finish this year] and it would be a New Year’s present to the American people,” she said.

Pelosi brushed aside suggestions that the House might accept whatever the Senate passes, rather than go to conference — although she said that about 75 percent of the two bills is the same.

She listed several issues that she wants a conference to address. These include the number of people who would gain health coverage, how to pay for the legislation, how quickly seniors would see the “doughnut hole” in their Medicare Part D prescription drug coverage close and abortion language. She also mentioned differences over the so-called public insurance option.

And she gave a little nudge to the Senate, whose slower legislative pace is a constant frustration to the House.

“We’re very eager to see the bill,” she said.