4/8/2017 1am UPDATE:
Hello AAPS Members and Friends!
The time for the hearing that will include SB 1148 has been set for 8am on Tuesday, April 11.
COMMITTEE: Business & Commerce
TIME & DATE: 8:00 AM, Tuesday, April 11, 2017
PLACE: E1.016 (hearing room located on first floor of Capitol Extension)
For map of meeting room locations, click here and see page 3.
Here is a link to the official hearing notice:
http://www.capitol.state.tx.us/tlodocs/85R/schedules/html/C5102017041108001.HTM
The notice states: “Public testimony will be limited to 3 minutes. If submitting written testimony, please provide 20 copies to the committee clerk with your name and bill number on each copy.”
If you are attending and need help making 20 copies of your testimony please just let us know.
Additional important details provided below.
4/7/2017 6am UPDATE:
Thank you for showing such strong support for Dr. Buckingham’s bill to end MOC requirements, SB 1148! Your comments to the members of the Business and Commerce Committee are being noticed and are making a difference.
We just found out that the Committee plans to include SB 1148 in their hearing next Tuesday, April 11 in Austin. The time hasn’t been announced, but as soon as we obtain the details we will let you know.
Here’s what you can do to help:
1. Physicians are needed to testify at the hearing. Typically, if the hearing starts at 8 am, it could take a few hours of waiting before it is your turn to testify. It can be a test of the will, so if you plan to give oral testimony, please be prepared to commit a few hours to the effort. Oral testimony is limited to 3 minutes typically. Please also bring a printed copy of your testimony to give to the committee.
2. Simply being present at the Capitol and registering to support the bill requires less of a time commitment (you don’t have to wait for your name to be called or for the full hearing) but is still a helpful way to show your support.
Please let us know ASAP, by replying to this email, if you can come to the Capitol Tuesday to help.
3. If you can’t be there in person, you can still give written testimony that can be submitted by someone else, without reading it, at the hearing (we can do this for you if you email us your testimony).
4. You can also send someone to testify on your behalf. That person would state that he/she represents himself and then note that he/she will be reading the written testimony of Dr.____.
[NOTE: If you scroll to the bottom of this alert there is a template to guide your written testimony.]
Thank you again for your help in supporting this important legislation to benefit Texas patients and their physicians.
~Sheila Page, DO, Chapter President
3/31/2017
Dear Texas AAPS members and friends,
Help us fight for SB 1148 which will allow Texas physicians to focus on their patients and NOT meaningless busywork that detracts from time better spent on patient care. This bill, authored by Sen. Dawn Buckingham, would prohibit the requirement of MOC participation for insurance reimbursement and hospital privileges.
The members of the Texas Senate Business and Commerce Committee Need to Hear from YOU today in support of SB 1148! Here are ways you can pitch in to this crucial effort:
Step 1: Email and call the Committee members with a simple message along the lines of: “Please support SB 1148 and end mandates on physicians that interfere with patient care.”
For email you can simply copy and paste the following list of email addresses into the “to” line of an email:
david.mills_SC@senate.texas.gov, patrick.tyler@senate.texas.gov, Krista.heiden@senate.texas.gov, katrina.smith@senate.texas.gov, cristina.ojibway@senate.texas.gov, emily.dove@senate.texas.gov, doug.clements@senate.texas.gov, drew.graham_SC@senate.texas.gov, timothy.stostad@senate.texas.gov, president@texasaaps.org
Phone numbers can be found below. Calls, when they become numerous, deliver a strong message to the Senators—they need to know you are watching the process. Ask friends and patients to call or email, to bring the perspective from the patients’ side.
COMMITTEE CONTACT INFO
Chair, Sen Kelly Hancock:
(512) 463-0109, david.mills_SC@senate.texas.gov
Vice Chair, Sen Brandon Creighton:
(512) 463-0104, patrick.tyler@senate.texas.gov
Sen Donna Campbell:
(512) 463-0125, Krista.heiden@senate.texas.gov
Sen Craig Estes:
(512) 463-0130, katrina.smith@senate.texas.gov
Sen Robert Nichols:
(512) 463-0103, cristina.ojibway@senate.texas.gov
Sen Larry Taylor:
(512) 463-0111, emily.dove@senate.texas.gov
Sen John Whitmire:
(512) 463-0115, doug.clements@senate.texas.gov
Sen Charles Schwertner:
(512) 463-0105, drew.graham_SC@senate.texas.gov
Sen Judith Zaffirini:
(512) 463-0121, timothy.stostad@senate.texas.gov
Step 2: The most helpful action you can take is to write a formal letter of testimony and present it at the hearing (see template below). If you cannot physically be there, someone else can read your testimony, but they have to register in their own name, and read your testimony on your behalf.
Another helpful action is to go to the hearing and register in favor of the bill. You do not have to testify, but it is helpful when a few dozen people show up. Remember, the other side will be paying people to be there. That is why the doctors in the trenches get buried in punishing regulation—no one there really represents the working doctors.
I will do everything possible to help you if I know you are planning to be there. Typically, there will be only 48 hrs notice (another reason working doctors get left out of the process). Currently, what I have been told is that we will get a hearing in the Senate on Sen Buckingham’s bill, SB1148, within the next 2 weeks. That is unfortunately all I know for now.
Finally, don’t forget that YOU can make a difference!! If we the physicians cannot step up at this time to defend our profession and our patients, we will certainly continue to lose ground.
All for the Patient,
Sheila Page, DO
President, TxAAPS
president@texasaaps.org
P.S. For additional information on this issue please click here.
Formal testimony template:
Date
Business and Commerce Committee
Dear Chairman Hancock and members of the Committee,
1. My name is ____ and I am testifying in favor of SB1148.
2. State whom you represent—a business, an organization, or yourself, which is very common. (if you are reading someone else’s testimony, simply state your name and other information as above, that you represent yourself, and that you are reading the written testimony of Dr. ___.)
3. Describe your practice and your patients and keep this patient-centered as much as possible.
4. Your testimony should be brief. The hearings allow only 2-3 minutes for public testimony.
Here’s sample testimony to help guide your talking points:
This bill would ensure that my patients have access to me as their doctor by controlling how Maintenance of Certification (MOC) is used in Texas. I have no problem completing the 48 hours of Continuing Medical Education required by Texas law, but hospitals and insurance companies should not require doctors to waste time away from patient care on onerous MOC tasks. More importantly, the data is quite clear that MOC does NOTHING TO IMPROVE QUALITY OF MEDICAL CARE. See this JAMA article – https://goo.gl/qDdjqO – that shows that those with life-time Certification were just as good as those who re-certified with MOC.