Posted on 01.18.10 by Executive Vice President Susan Hogeland, CAE

Bob Bourne, Barbara Kostick, Carla Kakutani, Ron Labuguen and I spent several days in cold Kansas City representing you on AAFP Commissions - Continuing Professional Development, Health of the Public and Science, Governmental Advocacy, Education and, in my case, Quality and Practice Enhancement.  Not only did we take on sizeable agendas on key issues for family medicine, we also heard reports on health care reform and the AAFP Consumer Alliance program from AAFP leaders Lori Heim and Ted Epperly.  They outlined, as I did in last week's blog, the many benefits to family medicine and primary care contained in the health reform legislation, to say nothing of the benefit to patients.

My commission took on issues ranging from e-visits to retail health clinics, CPT codes to various payment reform options, the SGR update to meaningful use of HIT, as well as the progress made by TransforMED in helping family physicians transform their practices to full patient centered care.  It was 2.5 days of non-stop meeting and discussion on your behalf by extremely dedicated volunteers. The amount of clinical and practice management knowledge in the room - between AAFP staff and physician volunteers - is amazing.  What's further amazing is the amount of dedicated time outside of the actual face-to-face meeting those volunteers spend - most offered to serve on "work groups" to further address issues or develop policies, and there are several electronic meetings during the course of the year, as well as an unending stream of emails and work that has to be done online.  Despite the hectic schedules of the Commission members, there was clear enthusiasm for positively affecting the practice lives of family physicians.

As a side note, it was concerning to me that no one in our state asked to be nominated for service on an AAFP commission in 2010 - the largest state in the Academy now has only FOUR physician representatives on commissions; last year we had a total of seven.  If you have interest in serving, it's helpful to have served on a CAFP committee first, but it's not mandatory.  Please contact CAFP and ask for an application.  You'd be joining a very special corps of committed family physicians if you are appointed.

CAFP was very occupied with budget matters last week - past president Carla Kakutani was interviewed on Healthline after CAFP issued a press release outlining the impact of the budget cuts on health and suggested ways to avoid those cuts.  You can hear her at:  http://www.californiahealthline.org/special-reports/2010/health-advocates-legislators-see-little-to-like-in-governors-proposed-health-program-cuts.aspx   Thanks to Dr. Kakutani and past president Jeff Luther as well, for their willingness to speak with the media.

CAFP also represented you at yet another meeting of the Regional Extension Centers in Sacramento last Monday and remains very engaged in the meaningful use challenge.  Hundreds of pages of draft regulations have now been issued outlining the meaningful use requirements, so we and others are pouring over them to determine how best to advise you to access the funds offered from Medicare or Medicaid in your office.