Welcome to our third issue of The ACP
Advocate:
Last
week, Senate
Finance Committee
Chairman Max Baucus released a white paper, Call
to Action, Health Reform
2009, containing his plan for Health Care
Reform.
It not only addresses goals that are also of the highest
priority
for ACP, but is remarkably consistent with ACP's policies on expansion
of health insurance coverage and recognizing the importance of primary
care. Senator Baucus, calling primary care the "keystone" of the
health
care system, proposes increases in Medicare payment rates for
primary care
physicians and expansion of the Patient Centered Medical
Home.
This issue of The ACP
Advocate features a
look at the Senator's white paper. It's linked to a letter of response from ACP President Jeffery
P. Harris, MD, FACP.
A white paper, How is a Shortage of
Primary Care Physicians Affecting the Quality and Cost of Medical Care?,
was released two days ago by
ACP.
It documents the value of primary care by reviewing 20
years of research. An annotated
bibliography based on a literature review of more than 100 studies documents the
evidence to
support the critical importance of primary care in providing
patients
with better outcomes at lower cost, and the urgency of the need to
prevent shortages of primary care physicians.
“The evidence for
the value of
primary manifests itself in better quality of life,
more productive
longevity, and lower costs as a result of reduced
hospitalization, improved
prevention and better coordination of chronic
disease care," ACP
President Harris, MD, FACP, noted.
"The nation must take
immediate steps to address the issues that threaten primary care’s survival.”
In addition to this white paper,
ACP is developing a new policy paper to
provide a comprehensive set of recommendations to assure that the supply of
primary care physicians is sufficient to meet current and future
needs. Many of
ACP’s ideas are
reflected in the Preserving
Patient Access to Primary Care Act, H.R.
7192, introduced by
Rep. Allison Schwartz of
Pennsylvania. This bill will be
reintroduced by Rep. Schwartz in the 111th Congress, and
Senator
Maria Cantwell of
Washington is
expected at
that time to introduce a companion bill in the Senate. Later in
2009,
ACP will release a position paper that
will make recommendations on how primary care itself needs to change to
meet the
needs of an aging population with more chronic
diseases.
And, a couple of things to remind you
about:
The ACP Advocate
Blog by Bob Doherty
reflects my work with ACP. It is not a
mouthpiece for ACP's
positions. Instead, I invite thoughtful commentary on the
most
provocative, ground-breaking and intriguing health policy discussions I
come across in my daily work.
Send your thoughts on the ACP blog to: TheACPAdvocateBlog@acponline.org.
Like The ACP
Advocate e-newsletter, the blog is another of the new communications
vehicles launched by the College to inform
members about public policy.
Produced by the College's Washington, D.C. governmental affairs division, the
newsletter and blog are created to provide you, our members, with
up-to-the-minute
information.
I hope this issue answers
many of your questions about what
we're doing for you on the advocacy
front.
Please send your feedback
and suggestions on this newsletter to: TheACPAdvocate@acponline.org.
Yours truly,
Bob Doherty
Senior Vice
President
Governmental Affairs and Public Policy
American College of
Physicians |