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Orange County Chiropractic District
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Memorandum to: ACA Members, Board of Governors,
House of Delegates and Other Interested Parties In this week's report: ACA TARGETS OFFENDING HMO; APTA WITHDRAWS FROM LAWSUITS While we continue to await the federal court's ruling on our motion for summary judgment in our Medicare lawsuit, the ACA is moving to take the gains we have made so far and apply them on a practical level. We have identified a Medicare HMO that has refused to provide chiropractic services to a Medicare patient. The HMO later stated that even if coverage is allowed for the patient, it would require the patient to be monitored by a medical doctor and that the medical doctor would have to identify the patient's subluxation. The recently released Operational Policy Letter (OPL) #23, resulting from our court action, has made clear that "As a standard Medicare Part B benefit, manual manipulation of the spine to correct a subluxation must be made available to enrollees in all Medicare+Choice plans." Mr. George McAndrews is now preparing a letter to the HMO informing it of its legal responsibility to make the service available in an appropriate manner. The ACA will also provide Mr. McAndrews' letter, or portions thereof, to all Medicare Managed Care organizations as well as to NCQA, which now serves to certify HMO compliance for the Medicare+Choice program. Mr. McAndrews, as you may know, has a special knack for getting his point across, legal and otherwise. In a related development, the APTA has withdrawn its motion to intervene in our lawsuit, claiming victory as it retreats. Maybe they should read OPL #23 again - especially the part that states, "They (Medicare+Choice organizations) may not use non-physician physical therapists for manual manipulation of the spine to correct a subluxation." CHIROPRACTIC ORGANIZATIONS CONTINUE TO SUPPORT LAWSUITS Last week the National Chiropractic Legal Action Fund received support from the following organizations: Pinellas County Chiropractic Society (FL): $1,422, bringing its total to $1,422; North Carolina Chiropractic Association: $2,000, bringing its total to $15,400; Allied Health of Wisconsin: $50, bringing its total to $32,675; Unified Chiropractic Association of Oklahoma: $5,000, bringing its total to $11,000; Chiropractic Association of Louisiana: $2,500; bringing its total to $7,000. ACA LONG RANGE PLAN (IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHERE YOU ARE GOING, ANY ROAD WILL GET YOU THERE) Participating in a long-range planning meeting can be equated to getting a root canal. However, in both cases, the end result justifies the pain. Last weekend, ACA's vice presidents and I joined Dr. Rick McMichael and the other members of the Long Range Planning Committee to conduct a comprehensive view of our existing plan. For those of you who have benefited from Dr. (Sergeant) Rick McMichael in his role as a facilitator, and there are many, you will appreciate it when I tell you that Dr. McMichael is a taskmaster who is very good at what he does. The other members of the committee who participated in this exercise include: Drs. Terrance Freitag from Wisconsin, David Herd from New York, Blair Bauer from North Dakota, Michael Taylor from Oklahoma, Glenn Manceaux from Louisiana, Joseph Morelli from Hawaii, and Da ryl Wills, ACA President. Also joining the meeting was Lisa Olszewski, SACA chair. I asked Dr. McMichael to summarize what he felt had been accomplished at the meeting. Here is his assessment: The ACA Long Range Planning Committee, including key leadership and staff personnel, met for two days to review, revise, update and prioritize the ACA's Strategic Long Range Plan. The group was energized by the long list of recent ACA successes and ongoing ACA initiatives. The conference participants continued to set aggressive goals for the ACA, as strategic reorganization was completed to create a more streamlined and focused Long Range Plan. The revised plan will move doctors of chiropractic forward into decision makers in health care and experts in health and wellness. ACA holds the vision of a bright future for doctors of chiropractic and the increasing number of patients who benefit from our safe, efficacious and cost-saving care. The revised ACA Long Range Plan was created to move us aggressively toward that vision. Together, our vision-in-action will continue to transform health care in the United States and the world. U.S. SENATE COMPETITIVE RACES AND CASH POSITIONING There will be a major push this year by both parties to change the composition of the Senate. As of now, the Democrats control the Senate by a razor-thin margin of one vote. Control of the Senate will depend on the outcome of six or seven competitive Senate races, where either an incumbent is facing a major challenger or there is an open seat. Here are the races which right now are considered competitive, with the respective cash positions of the candidates as of the first quarter reports for the year. Most observers will note the definite financial edge that incumbents have going into the election, although I noticed a couple of races where the margin is not very significant. Additionally, you can be assured that both parties will spend whatever is necessary to be competitive.
In New Hampshire, incumbent Senator Robert Smith faces a tough primary contest with Representative John Sununu. And the winner must face popular democratic governor Jeanne Shaheen. In North Carolina, there is an open seat for the retiring Senator Jessie Helms. Elizabeth Dole, former cabinet member in both the Reagan and Bush Administrations, faces Erskine Bowles, former chief of staff to Clinton. Dole currently has $2.6 million and Bowles $1.6 million. South Carolina has an open seat for the retiring Senator Strom Thurmond. Representative Lindsay Graham has $2.8 million in the bank, compared to Alex Sanders, who has $1.6 million. As one of the floor managers in the Clinton impeachment hearings, you know the Democrats would love to knock this guy off. WFC HOLDS CONFERENCE ON CLINICAL EDUCATION The World Federation of Chiropractic and the Association of Chiropractic Colleges are sponsoring a conference on clinical education in Sao Paulo, Brazil, from October 26-29, 2002. The goal of the conference is to bring together leaders from chiropractic education and practice around the world to discuss current innovations and challenges in chiropractic clinical education, with a view toward: a) improving and integrating pre-clinical and clinical education; b) defining the core common clinical skills for tomorrow's chiropractors internationally, and how to achieve these in today's chiropractic education; and c) promoting a consistent, clinical approach to chiropractic practice internationally, both at established and newer chiropractic colleges. If you are interest in attending and participating in this program, visit http://www.wfc.org/english/congress.html and scroll down to the second meeting listed for further information. NEW BACKPACK SAFETY PROGRAM FORMING: MEMBERS ONLY We are pleased to announce that the ACA has endorsed the Chiropak backpack. During the ACA's recent National Chiropractic Legislative Conference (NCLC), many of you visited with representatives from Chiropak and Samsonite, the U.S. distributor for Chiropak. Some of you expressed interest in a backpack safety program to present to your local school systems, PTAs, and other groups in critical need of your expertise on this subject. In conjunction with Dr. Scott Bautch, past president of ACA's Council on Occupational Health, as well as Chiropak and Samsonite, the ACA will begin offering materials and backpack safety training for this purpose. If you are interested in participating or would like to learn more, please email Leigh-Anne Perialas, ACA vice president of business development, at lperialas@amerchiro.org. USE YOUR COMMUTE TO BUILD YOUR PRACTICE If it's difficult to get out of the office to attend workshops and seminars, try ACA's phone conference audiotapes. These 90-minute seminars feature expert presenters and cover a variety of topics including: practice management, CA training, fraud and abuse, practice marketing, managed care, coding, and more (CEUs may be available - contact your state delegate). Listen to the seminar in your office, at home, or in the car. Build a library of audiocassettes to serve as ongoing training for your staff. Whether you're looking for basic information or creative new ideas, these seminar tapes are a convenient business development tool. Order five or more and take 20% off. Go to: http://www.lighthousemarket.net/acastore/dept.asp?dept%5Fid=8 CAN'T ACCESS THESE LINKS? Some of you have been unable to download my PDF links. To view these file types, you need Adobe's Acrobat Reader. This is a free utility available at www.adobe.com. If you need further assistance viewing anything referred to in this report, please email me at gcuneo@amerchiro.org. We have placed my weekly EVP report on our Web site, where members and non-members can download the report in various formats. We will have the report available in "Publications," "EVP Report." The report is available in .html and .txt formats. |
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