Stuyvesant Station P.O. Box 38004 Albany, NY 12207 Tel - (518) 439-0000 Fax - (518) 439-1400 Posted July 13, 2010 The June/July NYSSOS Newsletter is available Read Newsletter July 2010 Update from Edward Tanner, MD, President The NYS Legislature was slated to conclude its regular business on June 21st. However, without a 2010-2011 budget in place, the Legislature technically remains in session. This year the whole health delivery system in NY is under attack. Many proposals aimed at eroding the physician-patient relationship were introduced and acted upon. Allied health professionals saw their scopes of practice slated for expansion and rose to support all of these initiatives. The proposals that were introduced and received a lot of attention included: • Proposal to permit podiatrists to operate all of the way up the level of the knee; • Proposal to allow midwives to practice independent of a collaborative relationship with a physician; • Proposal to allow nurse practitioners to practice independently; • Proposal to license and regulate naturopathic doctors; • Proposal to allow optometrists to prescribe oral medications to their patients; and • Proposal to allow dentists to perform oral and maxillofacial surgery. While each of these bills have received a great deal of attention by legislative leaders and have been the subject of countless hours of meetings by representatives of organized medicine, the only one so far that has passed by both the NYS Assembly and Senate is midwife bill. However, we must all be on notice that the fact that these issues received a great deal of attention this year means that many of them will ultimately be passed into law. These changes should also be viewed in light of the language that was included in the Federal Health Care Reform bill adopted earlier this year by Congress which states in Section 2706 of the law that “[a] group health plan and a health insurance issuer offering group or individual health insurance coverage shall not discriminate with respect to participation under the plan or coverage against any health care provider who is acting within the scope of that provider’s license or certification under state law.” It is important to note that the language “any health care provider” opens the door to both physicians and allied health care providers to provide health care services to the estimated 30 million people who are currently uninsured and expected to move into insured status over the next two years. The push by allied health professionals to expand their scope of practice as much as possible now in order to be the primary health care provider to millions of newly insured Americans is tremendous. NYSSOS has been working very closely with the Medical Society of the State of New York (MSSNY) and the New York Coalition of Specialty Care Physicians to oppose the changes that would expand the scope of practice for thousands of practitioners. Clearly, New Yorkers would no longer receive the same level of high-quality medical care that they expect. While allied health professionals are an extremely important part of the health care delivery system, they are not a substitute for physicians. There is no question that some diseases will linger undiagnosed or unidentified and will move to advanced stages with fewer available treatment options and lower quality-of-life for many people. All of the physician professional organizations raised the dangers inherent in a healthcare system that is not controlled by physicians with Members of the Legislature every day through meetings, videos, letters, literature and expert testimony at public hearing. Many doctors have taken countless hours out of their practices to travel to Albany to deliver their message personally as well. The task for NYSSOS and other organizations is to coordinate our message and to keep beating the drum so we can protect the current healthcare system. The task before us is not easy. NYSSOS calls on all of the orthopaedic surgeons in New York who have not joined the Society to take a close look at what is happening in New York and to make an affirmative decision to support your profession by joining the Society today. The battle before us will be a lot easier to weather with your support…. and we may not be able to head off the storm without it. 2010 Membership Dues Pay Your 2010 Dues Online