State Medical Associations Lining Up Against Senate Health Care Bill
In case you haven't had time to keep up with all the state medical associations and doctor groups coming out in opposition to Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi's health care bills, here are several. I'll add more as I see them.
These are doctor groups in their own words.
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Floridas Largest Physician Group Sounds Alarm on Senate Health Care Bill
The Florida Medical Association, which represents nearly 20,000 physicians and medical students that serve millions of patients in Florida, has serious concerns about the health care reform bill currently moving forward in the United States Senate. The FMA supports health care reform, but the proposed Senate legislation contains many provisions that would undermine the patient/physician relationship and create even more access obstacles for Floridians.
While we agree with the goal of H.R. 3590 to ensure that patients receive fair treatment from insurance companies, this legislation does not adequately fix whats wrong with our current system. It contains many provisions that would allow government bureaucrats to interfere with patient care decisions and actually raises the cost of health insurance unnecessarily, stated FMA President James B. Dolan, M.D.
As a whole, the Senate bill falls short of true reform in the following critical areas:
It creates new bureaucracies, such as the Independent Medicare Advisory Board, and grants unchecked powers to the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (a non-physician) to make significant changes to the Medicare program. This would allow the federal government to make arbitrary decisions about reducing payments for life-saving specialty care for patients, thereby limiting treatment options for elderly patients.
It inappropriately expands the governments role in determining the quality of medical care by mandating physician involvement in the flawed physician reporting and efficiency programs that penalize physicians who allow insurance dollars to be spent appropriately on their patients. These so called pay-for-performance programs have been shown to have no positive impact on patient outcomes. They also appear to have unintended consequences, such as leading hospitals and doctors to avoid sicker patients.
It fails to fix the current Medicare physician payment system and envisions cuts in Medicare spending that could hurt Florida seniors. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has confirmed that a significant reduction in physicians Medicare reimbursement, which will occur without fixing the current system, will reduce senior citizens access to medical services.
It does not address an essential cost containment element medical liability reform. Numerous studies have demonstrated that effective medical liability reform will significantly lower health care costs by reducing the cost of defensive medicine and eliminating unnecessary litigation from the system.
It expands the failing Medicaid program by adding 1.4 million to 1.7 million more people to Floridas Medicaid rolls. In Florida, Medicaid patients already face a lack of access to care. This will only exacerbate the problem and shift the cost of this federally-mandated entitlement program to state taxpayers.
It will cause millions of Americans to lose their existing private coverage, and according to the nonpartisan CBO, 24 million people would still be left without insurance. The CBO also estimates large increases in insurance costs at a time when Americans need lower insurance premiums.
The most troubling aspect of the legislation is the tremendous expansion of government into the health care decision-making process. As doctors, we are taught to first do no harm, said FMA President- Elect Madelyn Butler, M.D. Unfortunately, the bill moving through the United States Senate does more harm than good by allowing bureaucrats to make patient care decisions, thereby putting the government between the doctor and the patient.
The governments U.S. Preventative Services Task Force recently declared that mammograms for women under the age of 50 were not recommended. Under the Senate bill, unaccountable bureaucracies like the task force would have vast new powers to coerce doctors to follow their recommendations, Dr. Dolan said. This is simply unacceptable.
Health care reform is too important to rush a flawed bill through Congress, added Dr. Dolan. We encourage the United States Senate to go back to the drawing board and draft a bill that will truly benefit our patients.
In the coming days we will ask our members to contact Florida members of Congress to let their views be heard, stated FMA Executive Vice President Tim Stapleton. We will also ask physicians to educate their patients about our concerns specifically issues related to access to care and interference in the patient/physician relationship.
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About the Florida Medical Association Founded in 1874, the Florida Medical Association's mission is to help physicians practice medicine.
With nearly 20,000 members, the Florida Medical Association is the largest physician association in the state of Florida. For more information about the Florida Medical Association,
visitwww.fmaonline.org
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OHIO STATE MEDICAL ASSOCIATION
Ohio State Medical Association opposed to Senate bill H.R. 3962
Excerpt:
The Ohio State Medical Association (OSMA) has long advocated for changes to address the problems in our health care delivery system. As such, we supported many initiatives in H.R. 3962, the Affordable Health Care for America Act, that expand access to care. However, we took a position of opposition to the bill because of several glaring deficiencies in the proposal.
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And OSMA also OPPOSES CURRENT DRAFT OF H.R. 3962, THE "AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE FOR AMERICA ACT"
See press release here.
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LOUISIANA STATE MEDICAL ASSOCIATION
Louisiana State Medical Society Opposes H.R. 3962 (also opposed House bill)
National Health System Reform - LSMS opposes H.R. 3962.
The LSMS opposes the bill as written. Although some of the bill's provisions are compatible with LSMS policy, the majority of its provisions are radically different from LSMS Policy on health system reform.
H.R. 3962 - Affordable Health Care for America Act
The LSMS opposes the bill as written. Although LSMS Policy is compatible with some of the concepts in the bill, the majority of its provisions are radically different from LSMS Policy on health system reform. In addition, the subject of tort reform is completely missing from the bill as well as the right of patients and physicians to privately contract. Finally, the most radical of the bill's provisions, the public plan option, is clearly against LSMS Policy 165.96, which is opposition to a national single payer health insurance system. The public plan option represents the gateway to a vast expansion of government control of the nations health care system and is the stalking horse of a thriving, competitive insurance marketplace.
Your help and commitment is needed to stop the steamrolling of the process of reforming our health care system. The LSMS believes health system reform should be done the right way for it to have a reasonable chance to succeed, not just for the sake of change. The LSMS is carrying this message to the members of Congress and will continue to do so. What is needed to multiply the pressure on Congress to do it right is Your voice added to those across this nation to change legislation reforming our health care system.
Contact your Congressman and voice your position on H.R. 3962.
For key points concerning the LSMS position on H.R. 3962, click here.
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TEXAS MEDICAL ASSOCIATION
Texas Medical Association opposition
Texas Doctors: Senate Health Plan Bad Medicine for Our Patients
After careful analysis of both the good and bad provisions of the U.S. Senate health system reform bill (HR 3590), the Texas Medical Association has determined that it will not support the bill until it undergoes some necessary and significant changes.
“We know that our patients – insured and uninsured, elderly and poor – need a much more efficient, effective, and accountable health care system,” said TMA President William H. Fleming III, MD. “But, on the whole, the Senate health plan is bad medicine for our patients.”
As health system reform legislation continues to move through the U.S. Congress, the TMA message to our senators and representatives remains constant: “Fix What’s Broken and Keep What’s Good.” The association is basing its assessment on a 17-point set of principles the TMA House of Delegates adopted earlier this year.
“The Senate proposal makes some great strides for our patients, such as providing incentives for primary care, requiring health insurance companies to be more accountable, streamlining insurance paperwork, and enhancing physicians’ access to information technology,” Dr. Fleming said. “Our patients are frustrated with paying higher and higher insurance premiums each year while receiving less and less in return. Certainly physicians and our office staffs are frustrated with the everyday hassles of dealing with insurance companies that constantly come between us and our patients.”
The Senate bill, however, does nothing to correct a flawed Medicare payment formula that Congress created in 1997. That formula is directly responsible for the slow erosion of access to care for seniors and the poor.
“Ultimately, what good is health system reform if our patients cannot find a physician?” Dr. Fleming said.
TMA also is requesting elimination of provisions in HR 3590 that:
- Would increase the cost of health insurance for our patients and deliver even less in return;
- Would quadruple federal government interference, bureaucracy, and red tape for patients and physicians;
- Would create incentives for patients to pay a fine for not having insurance rather than pay an unrealistic amount for insurance coverage;
- Would neither protect Texas’ liability reforms nor expand those protections to patients and physicians in other states; and
- Would impose untested and arbitrary treatment standards that do not improve the quality of patient care.
“Despite the partisan quagmire in Washington, we will work in coming weeks with our two U.S. senators to correct these and many other problems we see in the Senate bill,” Dr. Fleming said. “Right now, it’s simply bad medicine for our patients.”
TMA is the largest state medical society in the nation, representing nearly 44,000 physician and medical student members. It is located in Austin and has 120 component county medical societies around the state. TMA’s key objective since 1853 is to improve the health of all Texans.
Last Published: 11/23/2009
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On Eve of Finance Committee Action Neurosurgeons Announce Senator Baucus’ Healthcare ill Seriously Misses the Mark
(Washington, DC) –The American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) and Congress of eurological Surgeons (CNS) announced their opposition to the “America’s Healthy Future Act of 2009,” ecently released by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus. Additionally, while Senator aucus pushes ahead to finalize sweeping healthcare legislation extending coverage to the uninsured and ontrolling increasing healthcare costs, the AANS and CNS cannot ignore several key issues which are vital to ny overhaul plan and are missing from this bill including: concrete options for proven medical liability
reform and protections to ensure patient choice of physician, including the right of patients to privately ontract with their physicians (which allows for greater access to physicians and budget certainty for the overnment).
Troy M. Tippett, MD, President of the AANS, states, “There is a real urgency to have our voice heard. The enate Finance Committee will begin voting on this bill this week and as it is now drafted, the bill is extremely etrimental for physicians and our patients. As surgeons, we are especially concerned that this bill fails to
recognize or address the looming workforce shortages in surgery and specialty care which will greatly impact the next generation of Americans. In the year 2025, we’ll need 41,000 surgeons who simply just won’t be there.”
“We are pleased that this bill does not include a public option, but remain concerned that the alternative co-op proposal may likewise lead to a government-run plan, which we believe will ultimately reduce insurance
options and eliminate personal choice,” comments P. David Adelson, MD, President of the CNS.
“Unfortunately, this bill fails patients and doctors because it imposes new agencies and more bureaucracy and government than currently exists, which will ultimately interfere with the doctor-patient relationship.”
The AANS and CNS find the following provisions to be particularly alarming:
The bill fails to recognize the looming workforce shortages in surgery by requiring that all unused
medical residency training slots be allocated to primary care.
The bill is devoid of proven medical liability reforms and merely includes a “Sense of the Senate”
encouraging states to develop and test alternatives to the current civil litigation system as a way of
addressing the medical liability problem. It is well established that medical liability reform will improve
patient access to care and reduce defensive medicine costs, which have been estimated at $210 billion per
year and could help finance expanded health coverage.
The bill inappropriately expands the government’s involvement in determining the quality of medical
care and resource use. Doctors are mandated to participate in the Physician Quality Reporting
Initiative (PQRI) -- which does not effectively measure quality – or their fees will be cut by 2%.
Physicians who fail to comply with national resource use benchmarks faces cuts of 5%.
The temporary one-year SGR “patch” to replace the 21.5% payment cut in 2010 with a 0.5% payment
increase does little to address the serious underlying problems with the current Medicare physician
payment system and compounds the accumulated SGR debt, causing a payment cut of approximately
28% in 2011. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has confirmed that a “significant reduction in
physicians’ participation in Medicare would reduce beneficiaries’ access to services.”
Unchecked by Congress or the courts, the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human
Services would have unprecedented authority through, among other things, the new CMS
Innovation Center and the new Independent Medicare Commission to make significant changes to
the Medicare program, which permits the government to arbitrarily reduce reimbursement for
valuable, life-saving specialty care for elderly patients, thereby threatening treatment options.
Patient-centered healthcare is threatened by provisions curtailing the development of physicianowned
specialty hospitals and changes to office-based imaging.
Furthermore, AANS and CNS leaders are disappointed in the process leading to the development of this bill.
“Over the last several months, at the invitation of Senator Baucus, we, along with other medical professional organizations, have provided valuable input -- as a strong voice from the ‘front lines’ -- to help shape the future face of healthcare in America,” added Dr. Tippett. “And while we were thankful for this collaborative
opportunity during this monumental reform process, we are very disappointed that virtually none of our recommended changes are reflected in this bill, calling into question the value of this process.”
“We applaud lawmakers and the president in their dedicated efforts to provide affordable healthcare for all Americans and we wholeheartedly agree that healthcare reform measures are needed at this time. However, the AANS and CNS support a carefully targeted set of reforms, which improve the broken aspects of our present system. We stand firm that dismantling our current framework or creating a huge government bureaucracy is not necessary to achieve meaningful healthcare reform,” concluded Dr. Adelson.
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The American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS), founded in 1931, and the Congress of Neurological Surgeons (CNS), founded in 1951, are the two largest scientific and educational associations for neurosurgical professionals in the world. These groups represent approximately 7,600 neurosurgeons worldwide. Neurological surgery is the medical specialty concerned with the prevention, diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation of disorders that affect the entire nervous system, including the spinal column, spinal cord, brain and peripheral nerves.
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