 The American Academy of Urgent Care
Medicine has appointed Dr. Gary Klein, AAUCM member and ABUCM
Diplomatee, as its new liaison for Government Affairs.
Dr. Klein recently met with the chiefs of staff for Senator
Bill Nelson (D-Fla) and Congressman Robert Wexler, 19th District
of Florida. He presented them with requests for funding for
block grants to be used to:
- Obtain funding to further assist in the acquiring an EMR
- Help us further spread the word to medical schools on
our specialty
- Help us in obtaining education in order to meet national
disaster training for responders
At a hearing before Congress, Dr. Klein explained the unfair
practices that the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS)
uses in granting status to specialty boards. It seems that we
are not alone in our struggles. There were other groups who
presented who described their experiences with the ABMS. One was
Pharmaceutical Medicine, and the others were Hyperbaric and Dive
Medicine.
With Family Medicine having problems, and with Duke
University closing their FP program, Congress is looking to fund
more Nurse Practitioner programs. I explained that this is not
the answer. Dr. Klein explained that patients still want MD/DO
care, and the training IS NOT the same. On this point, Senator
Ted Kennedy (D-Mass) agreed.
In the next few weeks Dr. Klein will be meeting with the
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. He has applied to their grant
program in telemedicine, expressing that those urgent care
centers in rural areas would benefit from such programs as tele-dermatology,
and tele-psychiatry. |
