LEGISLATORS IN THE NEWS
Legislators in the News: Congressman Dr. Greg Murphy Lisa A. Moreno, MD MS MSCR FAAEM FIFEM, Immediate Past President
I
n this installment of Legislators in the News, we interview Dr. Greg Murphy (R) who represents the 3rd district of North Carolina.
LM: Dr. Murphy, thank you for taking the time to interview with me today and to share your perspectives on politics and medicine with the members of the American Academy of Emergency Medicine. Our members take advocacy very seriously, and they always are interested in knowing what prompted a physician Member of Congress to change your focus of service from the practice of medicine to elected political office. GM: I was the Chief of Staff at Vidant Medical Center in Greenville, North Carolina from 2013-2015 when a member of the North Carolina House of Representatives resigned. I was asked by the hospital board if I would consider that office, and I said no. The North Carolina State Medical Society pointed out that there were no physicians in the General Assembly, and so there was no one to represent our perspective and no one who could represent the patients’ perspective with a physician’s understanding of the issues. In fact, at that time, the head of the Health Policy Committee was a bail bondsman. My Catholic guilt took over (he smiles) and I accepted an appointment to that position. I served in the State House from 2015-2019. During that time, I was responsible for introducing the “Stop Act” and the “Hope Act,” both addressing the opioid epidemic. During this time, I continued to practice Urology. Then, Congressman Walter Jones developed kidney failure and ultimately succumbed to ALS. I was urged to run for Congress. Twenty six people ran. There were four elections over 24 months. I was elected. And I am the only physician Member of Congress (MOC) who still sees patients and operates. I would rather be called “Doctor” than “Congressman.” (Author’s note: Readers of this column will recognize a trend here. Dr. Murphy is far from the first physician MOC who has made this statement.) And along the way, I have continued to do mission work. Of course, this was impossible once COVID started, but I had already been doing mission work for 35 years. My wife is a nurse. We have been to India and met Mother Teresa and worked in her hospitals and have been to Swaziland and other countries of East Africa. I’ve been to Nicaragua about 30 times. I took a mission from Greenville to Haiti in 2010. In Congress, I have had two committee assignments to Education and Labor. I have served on the Veterans Affairs Committee. I am now on the Ways and Means Committee, serving on the Health Subcommittee which covers the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid. Sometimes Members wait years or even decades to get on these Committees. Sometimes, you just have good luck and it works out that a physician can serve on a health related committee. LM: What are the skills that made you a great physician that you are also using to be an outstanding legislator? 14
COMMON SENSE JULY/AUGUST 2022
GM: Well, despite what they say, creativity is not the highest form of intellect. Perception and empathy are the things that make you a good doctor and those serve well for the politician also. Perception is key in understanding your opponents in the legislature. Being an educator is a key component of being a doctor, and I find it a key component of being a legislator as well—especially as a physician-legislator. LM: As an elected official who is also a physician what do you perceive as the most critical health care issues facing America today? GM: Affordability, accessibility, and technology. In America, we have the best health system in the world in many ways, and in many ways, it’s also the worst system. Sometimes, the patient just fails to take advantage of the care that’s available for them. Other times, it’s the insurance companies that get in the way. Patients can have insurance, but still not have accessibility. The hoops that doctors have to go through to get approval for a procedure that we know our patient needs are unacceptable. Insurance companies are in business to make money, and they drive up the cost of health care. Doctors know what their patients need. And, of course, right now, we are facing physician shortages, especially in the rural areas. We see this in my state. And it is going to get worse. LM: How can the government address these issues and improve the health care of the nation? GM: Let’s look at affordability. First, Obama Care caused prices to skyrocket. We need a decrease in regulation in the health care industry. We could start by cutting administrators by at least one third. They are not contributing anything to health care, and they are driving costs up. Drug pricing is another area we need to address. The pharmaceutical companies are the ones who are benefiting from the high prices that patients are paying for drugs. Managers also take up a lot of the health care budget. And then, we need to look at the cost of malpractice insurance. This gets passed on to the patient. Our nation needs tort reform. North Carolina did a great job with this in 2011. Accessibility: There are too many doctors practicing in urban areas. We need to use specific measures to attract physicians to rural areas. One way would be to increase GME funding for rural health programs. Another would be to recruit medical students from rural areas. Many of these individuals are committed to the communities they grew up in. The lifestyle is familiar to them, and they often want to go back and serve in their own or similar communities. These are specific interventions that could work. Technology: We could take a lesson from other industrialized nations who ration care. What I mean by this is that palliative care discussions need to
>>