Newsletter
AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF PHY SICISTS IN MEDICI N E VOLUME 32 NO. 3
MAY/JUNE 2007
AAPM President’s Column details here, but comprehensive information on the bill has appeared in the AAPM newsletter before, most recently in the past two newsletter columns of Lynne Fairobent, the AAPM’s Legislative and Regulatory Affairs Manager.
Mary K. Martel UT MD Anderson Cancer Center
T
he CARE bill, licensure, ABR requirements to sit for the board exam, and pathways into medical physics (specifically clinical training): all are interlocking issues that will and must come together over the next few years, due in large part to on-going efforts on several fronts in the AAPM over the past decade. This year in particular is a crucial one; let me explain in a little more detail in this column. CARE Bill You may have heard of the CARE bill, probably because it has been around for at least eight years. It has a very good chance of being passed by both houses of Congress this year. This optimism stems from the successful passing of a form of the bill by the Senate in December ’06, and the introduction of the bill into the House of Representatives in January ’07. The history is more than a bit complicated and I leave out many
To briefly recap, CARE stands for “Consistency, Accuracy, Responsibility and Excellence in Medical Imaging and Radiation Therapy” Bill (www.thomas.loc.gov). To quote from Lynne Fairobent’s presentation at the Spring Board meeting: “The CARE bill will require that providers utilize individuals, who meet Federal education and credentialing standards, to perform the technical components of medical imaging and radiation therapy in order to participate in federal health programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and other programs administered by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Medical imaging examinations and procedures, as well as radiation therapy treatments for patients covered under these programs, would need to be performed by personnel meeting the federal standards in order to be eligible for reimbursement.” The passage of this bill will require the Secretary of HHS to work with expert advisors to develop standards. The “experts” are the Alliance for Quality Medical Imaging and Radiation Therapy, a coalition of 18 health care professional organizations (instrumental in the CARE bill development). Our AAPM representatives have been Jerry White,
David Keys and Jeff Masten, and with the Alliance, have been working to develop revised standards or regulations that will be submitted to HHS after the CARE bill has been enacted. Current regulations were published in 1985, and we all know these need updating! And so, the standards coming from HHS will need to be adopted by the states in order for providers in those states to participate in federal health programs. It is vital that the AAPM influence the new standards, in particular with recommendations to include requirement of board certification and, probably, licensure. Licensure Efforts A joint medical physics licensure subcommittee of the Professional Information and Clinical Relations committee (PICR) of the AAPM and the Board of Chancellors of the ACMP
(see Martel p. 17) TABLE OF CONTENTS ‘07 Award & Honor Recipients Chairman of the Board Column Executive Director’s Column Editor’s Column Professional Council Report Science Council Report CAMPEP News Education Council Report Health Policy/Economics Leg. & Reg. Affairs Incident Report Chapter Programs Chapter News MOC update ACR Accreditation FAQS Letter to the Editor
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