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DGR Telephone:
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Follow APA Advocacy on Twitter!
The APA Department of Government Relations is now on Twitter! Now you can find out about APA Advocacy activities, Congressional hearings, mark-ups, and floor votes in real time.
Please click on the following link to start following APA Advocacy Twitter:
http://twitter.com/apa_
advocacy
Questions about the Twitter page or how to set up an account? Please contact Kate McAllister at advocacy@psych.org. |
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Appropriations Update
On the night of September 29, Congress passed a continuing resolution (CR) to fund federal agencies and programs at current levels until December 3. The House passed the measure (H.R. 3081) 228-194 shortly after midnight September 30, a few hours after the Senate approved it. 227 Democrats in the House voted for the bill; 22 Democrats and 172 Republicans opposed it. The vote for final passage in the Senate was 69-30, with 19 Republicans voting yes. Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) was the only Democrat to oppose passage. Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), who is mounting a write-in campaign to retain her Senate seat, was absent.The CR is needed because Congress failed to approve any of the 12 regular appropriations bills for FY '11, which begins October 1. The CR funds most programs, including NIH, at FY '10 levels. Congressional negotiators on the CR denied a White House request to add funding for the Pell grant program. The House is in recess until November 15. The Senate is scheduled to be in recess until November 12, but is not expected to return to Washington until November 15. |
Reinstatement of Medicare Consultation Codes
Last week, APA joined several other cognitive medical specialties urging Senators to support the reinstatement of Medicare consultation codes. On January 1, 2010, CMS ended reimbursement for consultation codes despite warnings from the AMA, APA, and 16 other medical specialty societies that eliminating these codes would disproportionately impact cognitive specialties and would be detrimental to physician coordination of patient care. Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA) has initiated a sign-on letter to Secretary Kathleen Sebelius urging HHS to reinstate the Medicare consultation codes in its final Medicare Physician Fee Schedule Rule for 2011 which should be published this November. APA joined meetings with 11 Senate offices and Finance Committee staff urging Senators for their support and signature on the Specter letter. Using the AMA survey hosted earlier this year, we argued that cognitive specialties like psychiatry are disproportionately impacted and that coordination of care is jeopardized by the elimination of these codes. |
Truth in Advertising Legislation Passes in California
After a two-year battle, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, September 29, signed "Truth in Advertising" legislation. The new law (Assembly Bill 583) was strongly supported by the California Medical Association, the California Psychiatric Association and state medical specialty organizations. The effort also received support from the AMA Scope of Practice Partnership and other medical organizations. The law requires a health care provider to communicate to his or her patient the type of license and the highest level of academic degree obtained by the health care practitioner. The new law also requires health care practitioners who advertise on the Internet to prominently display this information. The bill applies to all health care practitioners with limited exceptions for certain health care facilities and laboratories. Here is a link to the law:
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/09-10/bill/asm/
ab_0551-0600/ab_583_bill_20100929_chaptered.pdf |
SGR Sign-On Letter
The APA has joined with the AMA and other medical organizations in signing on to a letter urging that Congress address the Medicare physician payment cuts scheduled to take effect in December and January during the first week of the upcoming lame-duck session. The letter urges Congress to provide Medicare payment stability at least through the end of 2011, to avoid another delay in payments and a repetition of the many disruptions that occurred this year. The letter is based on a lame-duck strategy developed in consultation with a task force of state medical societies and national specialty organizations convened by the AMA. Given the importance of the issue, the pre-election gridlock in Congress, and the uncertain political environment in coming months, the task force concluded that this initial step was needed before we can reach our shared goal of permanently repealing the sustainable growth rate (SGR) formula. |
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