A Brave New World

CHAPTER AFFAIRS

By Gregory K. Griggs, MPA, CAE NCAFP Executive Vice President

~ ACADEMY IN ACTION ~

By the time you are reading my quarterly column, it’s unclear what healthcare will look like in our state and country. I write this in early April as we prepare for a surge in COVID-19 cases in North Carolina. Yet, this magazine won’t hit your mail boxes until May. I am not sure anyone can predict what the next two months will look like, but one thing is clear: we are in unprecedented times.

So first, let me thank you for what you are doing. Family physicians are truly the frontlines of healthcare. And honestly, right now you are doing your job with one hand, maybe even two, tied behind your backs. You don’t have the Personal Protective Equipment you need. You are facing incredible financial strain as visits drop. And you are quickly switching to a world that is – at least temporarily -- built upon virtual visits to keep your healthy patients healthy and access your sick patients without further spreading disease, COVID-19 or otherwise.

It truly is a brave (and sometimes scary) new world.

Although honestly, I never feel like we can do enough to help someone as deserving as you, the state’s family physicians, our heroes of healthcare. But we are trying. Just to highlight a few things we have done:

First, we have tried to step up our communications. In fact, you may be tired of hearing from me and the rest of the NCAFP team. Prior to this crisis, we did our e-newsletter, NCAFPNotes, every other week. During this pandemic, we are sending out two or three e-newsletters a week, as information changes. We try to get you the most up-todate information in as concise of a format as possible, and make sure we focus on the information that is most important to family physicians. There’s so much information out there, we try to distill it to fit your needs.

Also relevant to communications, while we had already planned to launch a new and improved website, we expedited the launch amid this pandemic. It has allowed us to put information in one place for you much quicker than we have in the past. And I hope you are using our COVID page at www.ncafp.com as your home for up-to-date information during this crisis.

Even though Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) is scarce throughout the nation, we have taken every opportunity to ask anyone we can to get PPE out to family physicians on the frontlines of care in North Carolina. Every call we have had with the state Department of Health and Human Services and with the State Office of Emergency Management, we have talked about your frontline needs. And, trust me, that has been many, many calls. We’ve advocated with other payers to help get you PPE. We’ve looked for alternative means for PPE. As I write this, I can say we’ve not had great success, but we are still trying and hopefully relief will come soon.

Beyond NC DHHS, we have worked with NC AHEC and CCNC to bring you up-to-date information from the perspective of Medicaid, Public Health and others. Thanks to those organizations for scheduling weekly webinars to provide updates and counsel during this unprecedented time.

We are working to address your financial needs. As AAFP advocated with CMS and federal officials, we’ve advocated for financial relief at the state level, asking payers to step up and support primary care more than they ever have. We’re asking the state to step up both through Medicaid and through the General Assembly, to fill gaps not yet addressed by federal legislation. And state officials listened and doubled the PMPM for serving as a medical home for Medicaid beneficiaries.

We sought your feedback and are acting on it. Over twenty percent of our “Active” membership category responded to a survey on the early impacts of COVID-19 that we jointly conducted with the NC Pediatric Society. As I write this, your NCAFP Executive Committee has met to examine the results and provide direction on a few strategies to meet your needs.

And finally, your Academy staff made a quick pivot to move our Spring Symposium from a live meeting in Char

lotte to a virtual event totally based online. And we cut the price of the CME in half to make it as affordable as possible for you at a time when everyone’s finances are taking a hit. Your staff and our technology partners spent endless hours making sure this happened smoothly, and those efforts don’t come without a cost. And you stepped up, too. We had record registration for this symposium, with over 70 individuals registering after it became a virtual meeting. We are taking what we learned and hope to deliver education to you in new and different ways going forward.

While I don’t know what the next few months will hold, I do know a few things, and I believe there are some positives to gain from this experience:

Crisis brings out the best in good people, and it’s bringing out the best in our family physicians, developing innovative strategies to care for your patients.

I have always believed that Family Medicine should own telehealth, and I’ve seen that happen in recent weeks. We shouldn’t let others see your patients virtually. We need you to maintain that continuity. You know your patients the best, and thus can provide the best virtual care. Payers have at least temporarily stepped up and brought parity into telemedicine. We need to advocate for that on a permanent basis. And we need to ensure our members own the telemedicine space to care for your own patients, not allowing others to fragment care.

I believe that our country is finally seeing what the lack of investment in primary care and public health bring. We have reaped what we have sown. Our lack of investment in public health and primary care left us flat footed when this pandemic arose. Unfortunately, it’s likely not the last pandemic we will see, and I believe our country’s policy leaders are standing up and taking notice that our healthcare system must change. But it is incumbent upon all of us to take advantage of this opportunity and lead the charge to make that change. And I know you’ll join me and the entire NCAFP team in the fight for positive change.

Crisis breeds opportunity. Now is the time to put Family Medicine at the forefront of healthcare. We are here fighting to do just that. Let me know what you think. Keep in touch. But most importantly stay healthy so you can take care of your patients and communities. Thank you for what you do every day, but especially for what you are doing in this time of crisis.

NEW WEBSITE!!!

www.ncafp.com

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