| answering_the_call | Answering the Call | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/November/answering_the_call | <div class="col-md-12">
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<h5>November 6, 2020</h5>
<h2>Answering the Call</h2>
<h5>
<em>Members only; sign-in required.</em>
</h5>
<p>
By Pat Curry
</p>
<p>
At times, 2020 has broken our hearts and our spirits. The global pandemic of the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 made its American landfall in Washington state, slamming into our health care system with a vengeance that spared no one. An extremely efficient predator, the virus attacked the most vulnerable first and made the connection points that humans value most - a touch, a hug, a kiss, a song - potentially lethal.
</p>
<p>
The pandemic required an unprecedented response from our health care community, who accepted the challenge without hesitation. In this issue of WSMA Reports, we recognize the efforts of just some of the physicians who exemplified the best that health care has to offer.
</p>
<p>
It would be impossible to fully capture the extraordinary sacrifice and exemplary service demonstrated by WSMA members during this difficult year. As you read these profiles, consider each of them as representative of the thousands of physicians and medical professionals who faithfully served our communities during these past months, often at great risk to their own health. To each of you, we are grateful.
</p>
<h3>Policy</h3>
<p>
<strong>Kathy Lofy, MD</strong>. As the state health officer and chief science officer at the Washington State Department of Health, Dr. Lofy is one of a handful of people at the helm of the state's response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Lofy has
been a frequent participant at Gov. Jay Inslee's press conferences sharing information about the pandemic, using her medical training and calm demeanor to deliver critical updates on the latest science, data, and state policy. Dr. Lofy received WSMA's 2020 President's Unsung Hero Award for her extraordinary service.
</p>
<p>
<em>Ed. note: As this issue of WSMA Reports went to press, Dr. Lofy announced she will step down from her position as the state's top health officer at year's end. She will be missed and we wish her the very best.</em>
</p>
<p>
<strong>John Lynch, MD</strong>. As medical director of infection control and prevention at Harborview Medical Center/ UW in Seattle, Dr. Lynch has had a significant impact on national health care policy as it relates to the pandemic. He served on the panel to develop and write the guidelines for infection prevention in patients with suspected or known COVID-19 for the Infectious Diseases Society of America, of which he is a board member. "John is kind of the scientific cheerleader for this," said Chris Baliga, MD, medical director for infection prevention at Virginia Mason in Seattle. "He's a full-time academician. They're the ones who ponder the big questions, working nationally to advance the science, trying to keep the guidelines and opinions and position pieces in line with what we know. He heavily influenced the state and CDC policy in the early days from King County. That was work very much appreciated by all of us."
</p>
<h3>Public Health</h3>
<p>
Throughout the state, our public health officers have worked nonstop to provide up-to-date, evidence-based information to the health care community and the public to help reduce the spread of the highly contagious virus. Faced with ever-changing guidance, these health care guardians also have been forced to address everything from health inequity to conspiracy theorists insisting the virus is a hoax and that mask requirements are unconstitutional.
</p>
<p>
With King County the first epicenter of virus spread in the state, two public health heroes came to the fore:
</p>
<p>
<strong>Jeff Duchin, MD</strong>. In his role as health officer for Public Health - Seattle &amp; King County, Dr. Duchin has risen to national prominence. An epidemiologist and an infectious disease physician, Dr. Duchin used his position not only to provide the public with clear, science- based information, but also to shine a light on health inequities exacerbated by the pandemic. Dr. Duchin is a winner of WSMA's 2020 Grassroots Advocate Award for his informed, articulate, and committed advocacy work.
</p>
<p>
<strong>Scott Lindquist, MD</strong>. The former health officer for the Kitsap Public Health District and the current state epidemiologist for communicable diseases, Dr. Lindquist has helped lead multiple facets of the COVID-19 public health response, including testing, treatment, coordinating with local health officers, tribal health centers, and health care. Dr. Lindquist has also led surge activities by assisting local public health in testing, case contact investigation, and health care response.
</p>
<p>
Other counties soon saw their own struggles with COVID-19 and the emergence of their own public health heroes. Those include <strong>Anthony Chen, MD</strong>, director of health at Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department and chief health strategist for Pierce County; <strong>Teresa Everson, MD</strong>, public health officer for Yakima County, the state's second hotbed for COVID-19 cases; and <strong>Amy Person, MD</strong>, health officer for the Benton-Franklin Health District and the Klickitat County Health Department and immediate past president of the Washington State Public Health Association.
</p>
<p>
During an exceedingly challenging public health crisis, all of our public health officers across the state are heroes. Thank you for your service to keeping Washington's communities healthy.
</p>
<h3>Advocacy</h3>
<p>
<strong>Donna Smith, MD</strong>. Past president of the WSMA and medical director at Virginia Mason in Seattle, Dr. Smith is well known and respected, which helped facilitate her ability to jump into the political fray on behalf of the WSMA during discussions on issues such as the state's non-urgent procedure delay order and appropriate use of personal protective equipment. Her help in persuading the Legislature to extend the COVID-19 proclamations was key to WSMA's success in providing the state's health care professionals with the support they needed during the crisis. For her tireless work on behalf of the state's physicians, Dr. Smith is a winner of WSMA's 2020 Grassroots Advocate Award.
</p>
<h3>Telehealth</h3>
<p>
<strong>John Scott, MD</strong>. Officially the medical director for digital health at UW Medicine in Seattle, Dr. Scott is unofficially the Washington state telehealth czar. After participating in years of legislative negotiations that helped establish Washington as a leader in telehealth policy, Dr. Scott chairs the Washington State Telehealth Collaborative, which is charged with advancing excellence and innovation in telehealth for all Washington communities. During the pandemic, he worked tirelessly to support physicians who were transitioning care to telehealth, helping them stay connected with their patients and helping their practices stay afloat. For his own staff, Dr. Scott guided UW Medicine through its explosive growth in the use of telemedicine during the pandemic, from training physicians in all 45 specialties to establishing home monitoring for patients recovering from COVID-19. Dr. Scott is a winner of WSMA's 2020 Grassroots Advocate Award for his advocacy work in telehealth.
</p>
<h3>Trailblazers</h3>
<p>
<strong>George Diaz, MD</strong>. Chief for infectious diseases at Providence Regional Medical Center in Everett, Dr. Diaz treated the nation's first confirmed COVID-19 case, a Seattle-area man who had recently returned from China, alerting the medical community to the reality that COVID-19 was spreading globally. Dr. Diaz had guided the hospital through a pandemic drill just three weeks earlier and oversaw admitting the patient to an isolation unit within two hours after the CDC confirmed that he had the virus.
</p>
<p>
<strong>Francis Riedo, MD</strong>. An infectious disease specialist at EvergreenHealth in Kirkland, Dr. Riedo had the wisdom to do the first test for the COVID-19 virus in a hospitalized patient in Washington state. He had to scramble to contain the virus in his ICU, hospital, and community. He was responsible for reverse airflow rooms, PPE, screening protocols for 5,000 employees, employee testing, rotating shifts, daily communication to staff, press statements, and now is conducting one of the first trials for a COVID-19 vaccine. "Frank was living a nightmare scenario with the exposure and staff and number of patients," Dr. Baliga said. "He was the voice of pragmatism. He was having to navigate the reality of it early on in a horrific, dramatic way. [The Evergreen leadership] rose to the challenge and are a great example of what can be done."
</p>
<h3>Logistics</h3>
<p>
<strong>Michael Myint, MD</strong>. As physician executive for population health at MultiCare in Seattle, Dr. Myint has provided thoughtful guidance on hospital efforts to provide personal protective equipment. He set up a PPE inventory and sharing program that would allow hospitals to access and to share PPE. Health care systems received many donations, but sometimes only small numbers. By aggregating the available inventory, one institution would be able to have enough supply of that mask to adequately fit, test, and protect that cohort of staff.
</p>
<h3>Mental Health</h3>
<p>
<strong>Avanti Bergquist, MD, MS, FAPA</strong>. A child and adolescent psychiatrist with the Eating Recovery Center of Washington in Bellevue, Dr. Bergquist has been a constant and consistent source of information for physicians and parents to help children deal with difficulties related to the pandemic. A distinguished fellow of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Dr. Bergquist also is vice president of the Renton School Board and has been an advocate for schools providing mental health support to students as they return to the classroom.
</p>
<h3>Volunteerism</h3>
<p>
<strong>Lucas Hansen, MD</strong>, emergency room physician at Providence St. Peter Hospital in Olympia. Early in the pandemic, Dr. Hansen responded to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's plea for health care workers from across the country to go to New York to help. He spent two weeks treating patients at Elmhurst Hospital in Queens, a hospital described by The New York Times as "the epicenter of the epicenter" of the COVID-19 epidemic in New York City. On his return to Washington state, he shared lessons learned with fellow physicians. Dr. Hansen's example of commitment and caring is echoed by the thousands of health care professionals in Washington state and across the nation who have put their own health at risk to care for COVID-19 patients.
</p>
<h3>Research</h3>
<p>
<strong>Lisa Jackson, MD</strong>, Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in Seattle. Dr. Jackson is the principal investigator for a National Institutes of Health- funded investigational vaccine for SARS- CoV-2. Their Phase 1, dose-escalation, open- label trial of the mRNA-1273 vaccine was held in March; it included 45 healthy adults who received two doses 28 days apart. It was successful in producing an immune response in all participants evaluated. In July, Dr. Jackson and her team reported on the results of their trial in the New England Journal of Medicine. Following the report, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told the Associated Press, "No matter how you slice this, this is good news." The study has now moved forward to a 30,000-person trial to determine if the vaccine is effective.
</p>
<p>
<strong>Alison Roxby, MD</strong>. An assistant professor of global health and medicine at the University of Washington in Seattle, Dr. Roxby received national attention on how a study team prevented a COVID-19 outbreak in an assisted living community by testing and surveying all the staff and residents and implementing stringent social distancing, sanitation, and other prevention measures. The CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly covered Dr. Roxby's study; she spoke with Rachel Maddow on MSNBC on the importance of the research findings, as a high percentage of coronavirus deaths have been associated with community spread in senior living facilities.
</p>
<h3>Infectious disease physician "superheroes"</h3>
<p>
In the last days of February, a group of King County infectious disease physicians began a furious email string about the guidance coming from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and what they were facing in their respective hospitals. It quickly became an unofficial peer support group of physicians. But it was much more than that, Dr. Baliga said.
</p>
<p>
"Our entire infection prevention plan - precautions we were using for people with COVID, deciding who gets the respirators, what to do as you run out of various parts of PPE, what to do when your staff is exposed - is based off this group, especially early on when the guidance was very vague or didn't work. ... In the first few months, we had this scenario where we were really the front-line team trying to help navigate the CDC and public health guidance and directing it back. This group was instrumental in that."
</p>
<p>
Together, they were selected as winners of WSMA's William O. Robertson, MD, Patient Safety Award, which recognizes patient safety initiatives in the ambulatory care setting. They are:
</p>
<p>
<strong>Chris Baliga, MD</strong>, medical director for infection prevention, Virginia Mason in Seattle.
</p>
<p>
<strong>Peter Hashisaki, MD</strong>, infectious disease specialist, Overlake Medical Center &amp; Clinics in Bellevue.
</p>
<p>
<strong>John Lynch, MD</strong>, medical director of infection control and prevention, Harborview Medical Center/University of Washington in Seattle.
</p>
<p>
<strong>John Pauk, MD, MPH</strong>, infectious disease specialist, Swedish Center for Comprehensive Care in Seattle.
</p>
<p>
<strong>Francis Riedo, MD</strong>, infectious disease specialist, EvergreenHealth in Kirkland. Olympia Tachopoulou Stafford, MD, infectious disease specialist, Franciscan Infectious Disease Associates at St. Joseph in Tacoma.
</p>
<p>
<strong>Danielle Zerr, MD, MPH</strong>, infectious disease specialist, Seattle Children's; division chief of pediatric infectious diseases at the University of Washington in Seattle.
</p>
<p>
Dr. Baliga was quick to point out that the King County ID doctors are far from being alone in their efforts to fight the virus. Dr. Riedo cited the work of <strong>Mark Johnson, MD</strong>, an infectious disease specialist with Confluence Health in Wenatchee. Dr. Johnson "has been instrumental working with health care providers in Central Washington to provide both clinical care and the public health messaging needed to stem the tide of new patients," Dr. Riedo said.
</p>
<p>
Indeed, physicians are working together at unprecedented speed to bring the virus under control.
</p>
<p>
"Part of the messaging," Dr. Baliga said, "is that this group is part of a much larger group of people trying to deal with this."
</p>
<p>
<em>Pat Curry is senior editor of WSMA Reports.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the Nov./Dec. 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter.</em>
</p>
</div> | 11/6/2020 11:17:51 AM | 11/6/2020 11:16:33 AM | 11/6/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| doctors_making_a_difference_yuan_po_tu_md | Doctors Making a Difference: Yuan-Po Tu, MD | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/November/doctors_making_a_difference_yuan_po_tu_md | <div class="col-md-12">
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<h5>November 2, 2020</h5>
<h2>Doctors Making a Difference: Yuan-Po Tu, MD</h2>
<h5><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></h5>
<p>
<em>Ed. Note: The November/December issue of WSMA Reports featured an edited interview with Dr. Tu. Read the full-length version below. </em>
</p>
<p>
After the first community-acquired U.S. case of COVID-19 was identified in late January at The Everett Clinic, Yuan-Po, Tu, MD, and his colleagues at The Everett Clinic, part of Optum, reacted quickly. Drawing on their experience with the H1N1 pandemic in 2009, clinic leaders knew that securing personal protective equipment for health care workers would be vital. Despite having a stockpile of PPE and orders placed for more, by the first week of March, the clinic was burning through PPE at an alarming and unsustainable rate.
</p>
<p>
In January, Dr. Tu, an internal medicine physician who works at the urgent care walk-in clinics at The Everett Clinic, had been awarded a United HealthCare clinical research fellowship to study the impact of clinical decision support in the electronic medical record system on antibiotic stewardship. With the impact of the emerging pandemic in March, he shifted the study focus to what he thought could help alleviate the strain on PPE supplies by designing and executing a study to examine the sensitivity of patient-collected specimens for COVID-19 testing.
</p>
<p>
<strong><em>WSMA Reports:</em> What brought about the idea to study patients self-administering nasal swabs for testing?</strong>
</p>
<p>
In the early days following identification of the first COVID-19 patient, we could see that we were consuming surgical masks and PPE at an alarming rate. In the first three days of the response, the warehouse had issued nearly 10,000 surgical masks. We calculated that we were using 2.2 sets of PPE with N-95 respirators to test each patient for COVID-19. This was a huge amount of PPE and represented a non-sustainable burn rate.
</p>
<p>
Nasopharyngeal sampling has been the tried-and-true method for testing for upper respiratory viruses. I knew that we could recover influenza virus from nasal samples, as we have been using nasal samples to test for influenza for years.
</p>
<p>
One of the basic principles of occupational health is to remove the danger from workers. I hypothesized that we would be able to recover the SARS-CoV-2 virus from nasal samples and that we could remove the risk to the health care workers by having the patient self-collect the samples.
</p>
<p>
<strong>What advantages do nasal swabs self-collected by the patient have over testing done by a health care worker?</strong>
</p>
<p>
Nasal collection saves PPE by decreasing the potential for aerosolization and, hence, the risk of exposure to health care workers. Nasal sampling is a lot faster than nasopharyngeal sampling and is much more comfortable for the patient compared to NP swabs.
</p>
<p>
<strong>How do you see the pandemic playing out this fall and winter? </strong>
</p>
<p>
I anticipate that the number of COVID cases will increase, as we always see more upper respiratory illness in the fall and winter months. Congregation of people in close quarters indoors can results in rapid outbreaks, as we have seen with the opening of colleges.
</p>
<p>
Testing continues to evolve. Since March, clinical innovation has changed testing for COVID. We have evolved from nasopharyngeal sampling to self-collected nasal swabs. Other studies have shown that foam polyester swabs are equivalent to flocked nylon swabs. Other transport media, including 0.9% saline and phosphate-buffered saline, have been shown to be equivalent to viral transport media.
</p>
<p>
We now know that dry swabs used to collect nasal specimens are stable for three days and are equivalent to swabs transported in liquid media. This has facilitated home collection and shipping the specimen to a central testing lab.
</p>
<p>
<strong>What complications do you anticipate with COVID-19 colliding with flu season?</strong>
</p>
<p>
The winter season will increase the challenge of identifying patients with COVID-19, as any person with upper respiratory viral symptoms will have COVID-19 in the differential and will need to be tested. In a normal flu season, patient census is often close to capacity of hospitals. Adding COVID-19 patients will put additional strain on hospital systems.
</p>
<p>
Every effort should be made to maximize influenza vaccinations this fall to try to decrease the burden of influenza in our community.
</p>
<p>
<strong>In an ideal world, how would testing look for the remainder of the pandemic?</strong>
</p>
<p>
Ideal testing would be inexpensive, fast, accurate, simple to perform, and widely available. Ideal testing would be a test that could be performed at home without the need for medical supervision, with the results available in minutes without a reader or instrument.
</p>
<p>
<strong>What is the biggest barrier standing in the way of achieving that?</strong>
</p>
<p>
Just like nasal testing changed how we collect specimens for testing, we will need a fundamental change in how testing is performed. Molecular testing for COVID-19 currently is expensive, complicated, and requires complex equipment.
</p>
<p>
Multiple antigen tests have been approved by the FDA, with EUA for symptomatic individuals. Depending on the sensitivity and specify, antigen testing may be able to be used to test a wider number of individuals.
</p>
<p>
Other technologies are in development that have potential for changing how we test. But they are much further from commercial release.
</p>
<p>
<strong>What has the pandemic response so far revealed in terms of what systems we should have in place to better respond to future crises?</strong>
</p>
<p>
Severe pandemics cause unprecedented medical, social, and economic impacts. Pandemic infections affect the entire world. Effective political leadership, coupled with medical and social guidance, is key to responding effectively. There will be a next time. Analysis of how we respond will be key to learning how to respond better to the next pandemic. No single individual or single system will be able to succeed alone. To do better, we need our entire political, public health, and medical systems to be better as a team.
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the Nov./Dec. 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter.</em>
</p>
</div> | 11/2/2020 3:36:18 PM | 11/2/2020 12:32:27 PM | 11/2/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| wsma_responds_to_covid_19 | WSMA Responds to COVID-19 | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/November/wsma_responds_to_covid_19 | <div class="col-md-12">
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<h5>November 2, 2020</h5>
<h2>WSMA Responds to COVID-19</h2>
<h5><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></h5>
<p>
By Rita Colorito
</p>
<p>
Shortly after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed the first U.S. coronavirus case in Snohomish County on Jan. 20, officials from the Washington State Department of Health reached out to the WSMA. At the time, the DOH had minimal information to share.
</p>
<p>
Jennifer Hanscom, WSMA's executive director/CEO says she appreciated the heads up. "I remember thinking, 'Oh, that's good that they're informing us, but it sounds like it's well controlled,'" she says.
</p>
<p>
In late February, Hanscom received another call from DOH, this time more urgent. Coronavirus was racing through the Life Care Center in Kirkland. "They told us they were mobilizing an information center to deal with COVID-19," says Hanscom. "That's when I knew, 'Wow. This is it. This is going to be big.'"
</p>
<p>
Within weeks, Washington state had become the U.S. coronavirus epicenter. On March 11, the World Health Organization formally declared COVID-19 a global pandemic. The WSMA found itself on the front lines of helping its members manage a novel coronavirus with little understanding at the time of how the virus spread or how to contain it.
</p>
<p>
"We quickly realized that we have to be the eyes and ears for our physician members," Hanscom says. "We also had to make sure patients felt informed and safe. We wanted to be a trusted voice for them as well."
</p>
<h3>Getting the word out</h3>
<p>
The WSMA's first order of business was keeping members and the public informed in real time. That meant sifting through an overload of constantly changing—and often conflicting—medical information. Most of this was done virtually, as the association encouraged its staff to work remotely beginning on March 10.
</p>
<p>
"We realized we needed a physician lens on this, so that we could understand the clinical implications," says Hanscom. To accomplish this, WSMA's executive committee met virtually at 7 a.m. every Wednesday. Consensus was then shared with WSMA members and other public health stakeholders.
</p>
<p>
Armed with clear, science-based information from the state's physician leaders, Hanscom managed a response she described as "fast and furious." Association staff often worked late into the night and on weekends. "I was counting on my team to be available 24/7, to make sure we were getting accurate information," she says.
</p>
<p>
"Fast and furious" is an appropriate way to describe the level of activity, says Jessica Martinson, WSMA's director for continuing professional development.
</p>
<p>
"I remember having four concurrent meetings on my calendar and trying to be at one of them on my cell phone and one on my computer simultaneously," she recalls. "It was this huge flurry of activity."
</p>
<p>
Email blasts were sent to every physician and physician assistant in the state, regardless of membership, as well as to county and specialty medical societies, and to the CEOs and CMOs of clinics, hospitals, and hospital-based medical groups. The WSMA also updated its website with the latest information and conducted outreach through press releases, contacting reporters, and using social media, particularly Twitter.
</p>
<p>
To reinforce emerging best practices and tackle misinformation, the association coordinated messaging with the Public Health - Seattle &amp; King County, the University of Washington, and Virginia Mason. "From a public health perspective, it was important we were all saying the same things," says Hanscom.
</p>
<h3>Managing public health</h3>
<p>
That coordination was critical; in the early days of the pandemic, COVID-19 mitigation efforts were scattershot. Lacking guidance from the federal government, Washington state and the WSMA were left to figure things out on their own.
</p>
<p>
On March 6, Martinson went to EvergreenHealth in Kirkland to teach a scheduled course to certify advance care planning facilitators. (Health care systems would come to rely on such planning to help elderly patients navigate end-of-life decisions precipitated by COVID-19). This was before the now- standard practice of wearing masks.
</p>
<p>
"We wrestled with whether we had any business being there," says Martinson. EvergreenHealth had registered the state's first COVID-19 death on Feb. 28. Most of the Life Care Center cases had been taken there. The hospital was quickly becoming ground zero for COVID-19 deaths.
</p>
<p>
Martinson focused on making the class as safe as possible, ensuring social distancing, and providing hand sanitizer. "Everyone was cool-headed, but you could tell they were under intense pressure," she says. "But we weren't talking about rationing ventilators yet. We weren't in that mindset at all. It wasn't part of the national conversation," says Martinson.
</p>
<p>
By mid-March, WSMA's executive committee had reached a stunning conclusion: The state could run out of ventilators, beds, and personal protective equipment. The WSMA sent an urgent letter to Gov. Jay Inslee advocating for the shutdown of non-urgent medical procedures—a step that the University of Washington Medical Center and Swedish Health Services had already taken.
</p>
<p>
The governor quickly followed the medical community's advice. On March 19, he announced restrictions on non- urgent medical and dental procedures, which remained in effect until May 18.
</p>
<p>
WSMA members also began raising the alarm that "business as usual" was a threat to public health. They were adamant the state shut down non-essential businesses and gatherings, says Hanscom.
</p>
<p>
In response, the association submitted another letter to Gov. Inslee. WSMA's members were part of the catalyst for Inslee's "Stay Home, Stay Healthy" orders, which went into effect on March 25 and include a four-phase, county-by-county "Safe Start" reopening plan.
</p>
<h3>Tackling legislative issues</h3>
<p>
The state's legislative session, which ended on March 12, was in its waning weeks as the virus became the top priority. The Legislature scrambled to appropriate $200 million in state budget reserves to fund the pandemic response. WSMA negotiations on other issues took a back seat as it grappled with a host of shutdown-related issues, says Sean Graham, WSMA's director of government affairs.
</p>
<p>
"We had calls with each member of our state's congressional delegation to update them on what was happening in our physician community," says Graham. Legislative priorities included ensuring sufficient personal protective equipment for physician clinics, creating flexibility around the state certificate of need laws and physician licensure law, and ensuring appropriate liability protections for care that was delivered or delayed during the pandemic. The WSMA focused on how members could keep patient care front and center.
</p>
<p>
Ensuring payment parity for telemedicine, long a WSMA priority, became even more essential, says Jeb Shepard, WSMA's director of policy. In fact, the legislative session ended with WSMA achieving long-fought success in the creation of the Washington State Telehealth Collaborative. It requires insurance carriers to pay for telehealth services if they reimburse providers for face-to-face service.
</p>
<p>
"That piece of legislation was signed by the governor in early April, but the issue was it wasn't effective until January 2021," says Shepard. With the legislative session over, the WSMA had to get creative to get telehealth covered in 2020.
</p>
<p>
"We urged the Office of the Insurance Commissioner and the governor's office to take whatever action was in their emergency authority to implement payment parity," says Shepard. In Washington state, the governor can strike out portions of a legislative code, but can't add to them, explains Shepard. To get telehealth payment parity immediately, Gov. Inslee struck out the effective date of the law that had just passed.
</p>
<p>
"That unleashed a proliferation of telemedicine and we saw a rapid transition to telehealth among smaller and mid-sized practices," says Shepard.
</p>
<p>
By May, the medical community had a better understanding of COVID-19 and how to mitigate spread of the virus. The WSMA began hearing from members that the shutdown of non-urgent procedures was hurting their economic viability.
</p>
<p>
It was also taking an emotional toll, as physicians had to furlough personnel to keep their practices solvent.
</p>
<p>
The WSMA worked with the Washington State Hospital Association, Washington State Nurses Association, and the Ambulatory Surgery Center Association to help clarify Gov. Inslee's proclamation on non-urgent procedures so that physicians could use their clinical judgment without fear they were breaking the law.
</p>
<h3>Going forward</h3>
<p>
With a handle on the logistics of COVID-19, the WSMA began shifting its focus to physician well-being. In April, Martinson conducted a five-part webinar series to help members discuss what it means for patients with serious underlying conditions who develop COVID-19. "These are really hard conversations for physicians to have, but they're necessary," says Martinson. More than 500 members participated. The association also conducted webinars on telehealth and communicating under stress and hosts the COVID-19 Grand Rounds series.
</p>
<p>
"We were hearing from our members that they were under enormous pressure and that they were not getting the support they needed," says Martinson.
</p>
<p>
The WSMA reached out to several employee/physician assistance programs in the state. "We wanted to make sure our members had access to professionally trained mental health experts," says Martinson. The association also connected members to resources that could facilitate group debrief sessions. This was separate from WSMA's work on physician burnout.
</p>
<p>
"Everyone's grappling with COVID-19; some were more directly impacted than others," Martinson says. "Front-line physicians may experience trauma and are susceptible to PTSD. So, it's not just a matter of being resilient and having good workflow."
</p>
<p>
The WSMA also facilitated weekly Zoom meetings for ICU and critical care physicians to share their experiences. About 30 regularly attend these now- monthly virtual meetings.
</p>
<p>
Both the WSMA and Washington state are preparing for the uncertainty of the fall and winter months, and the association's work to promote an evidence-based approach to the pandemic is far from over. In September, in a necessary, but previously unfathomable move, WSMA corrected CDC misinformation.
</p>
<p>
"We had to explain to our members that Washington state isn't following CDC guidelines on COVID testing because those guidelines don't follow the science," says Hanscom.*
</p>
<p>
Retired Navy Vice Adm. Raquel Bono, MD, state director for COVID-19 Health System Response Management, has convened a series of pandemic-focused working groups. WSMA's secretary- treasurer, Nariman Heshmati, MD, has participated in working groups on personal protective equipment and contact tracing.
</p>
<p>
"Our work is still continuing," Hanscom says. "It's just happening in a more organized, less frantic fashion."
</p>
<p>
<em>* On Sept. 18, the CDC reversed its guidance and recommended that people without symptoms who have been in close contact with an infected person need to be tested.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>Rita Colorito is a freelance journalist who specializes in covering medicine and health care. She is a regular contributor to WSMA Reports.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the Nov./Dec. 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter.</em>
</p>
</div> | 11/2/2020 3:37:13 PM | 11/2/2020 3:31:55 PM | 11/2/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| equity_in_medicine | Equity in Medicine | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/August/equity_in_medicine | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/WSMA-Reports-Sept-Oct-Article-Image-645x425px%20(002).jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports September-October 2020 cover" /></div>
<h5>August 31, 2020</h5>
<h2>Equity in Medicine</h2>
<p>
By John Gallagher
</p>
<h5><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></h5>
<p>
An estimated 10,000 health care professionals and students, wearing white coats and scrubs, walked from Harborview Medical Center to Seattle City Hall on June 6 in a Doctors for Justice event to protest racial violence. They had responded to a call to action from Estell Williams, MD, an acute care surgeon at the University of Washington Medical Center and an assistant professor of surgery at the UW School of Medicine, who asked her colleagues to "show the full strength of Medicine that seeks justice for the most marginalized of our community."
</p>
<p>
Motivated in part by the experiences of her own family, Dr. Williams organized the march with her husband, Edwin Lindo, JD, a lecturer at the UW School of Medicine. "I have experienced police violence, racism, and mortality as a result of disparate outcomes experienced by the Black community within my family," Dr. Williams says.
</p>
<p>
In a letter announcing the march, she recalled a childhood event seared in her memory. Her father was pulled over by police while they drove home through a predominantly white neighborhood. As the officers searched their car, "I cried in fear and terror in the backseat, thinking of what they had done to others who looked like my dad," she wrote. "They handcuffed him, took him to the police station and forced him to stay there, while I had to wait in the street for my mother to pick me up. They released him two days later without a charge or valid reason for arresting him. To be clear, my father never committed a crime in his life, and the pain and fear I felt for the days he sat in the jail never leaves my mind. I knew there was a possibility that I would never see him again."
</p>
<p>
Just as importantly, she believes doctors should use their position of privilege to call out all the issues that harm the health of their patients, from overrepresentation in the justice system to poverty, housing, and employment.
</p>
<p>
"All of these things interconnect," Dr. Williams says, "and we as health care workers have to recognize it and speak out because the true health of our communities exists outside the walls of the hospitals and clinics."
</p>
<p>
The renewed awareness about racism has led to a fresh look at health equity issues. For decades, physicians have known that the race or ethnicity of patients or the language that they speak can have an effect—often negative—on their health. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, Blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans/Alaska Natives had higher infant mortality rates, die from diabetes at a higher rate than whites, and are in general more likely than whites to report fair or poor health status. Asian Americans/Pacific Islanders overall often fare better than whites, but with wide variation among subgroups.
</p>
<p>
Health equity has always been a complex issue.
</p>
<p>
"Defining 'equity' depends on who you are," says Michael Schaffrinna, MD, chief medical officer at Community Health of Central Washington, which operates federally qualified health centers (FQHCs) in underserved areas. "For some, it's access to care. But there's much more to health care than just getting an appointment or, for that matter, having good clinical care."
</p>
<p>
The COVID-19 pandemic has thrown into sharp relief the issue of health disparities, with much higher rates of infection and death among Blacks and Hispanics. But another event this spring has also affected the discussion about health equity: the killing of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis and the subsequent demonstrations about racial injustice.
</p>
<p>
The extent to which racism has affected medicine's ability to eliminate health disparities is now part of the conversation in a way that it never has been in the past. "Racism is a public health emergency of global concern," a recent editorial in The Lancet said. "It is the root cause of continued disparities in death and disease between Black and white people in the USA."
</p>
<p>
"It feels that the normalization of the conversation is much more universal," says Benjamin Danielson, MD, chair of the Governor's Interagency Council on Health Disparities and clinic chief at Seattle Children's Odessa Brown Children's Clinic. "I spent a lot more time preaching to the choir before. Now perhaps the sense of importance and maybe the less compromising nature of the situation does put some emphasis behind real conversations about health equity."
</p>
<p>
Certainly, medical systems have been working hard for years to reduce health disparities. Dale Reisner, MD, medical director (OB-GYN Quality &amp; Safety) at Swedish Health Services and a past president of WSMA, notes that her health system started working to address the issues well before the latest focus on racism.
</p>
<p>
"Even before George Floyd, we have really been trying to enhance our abilities to address health disparities with trainings, information sessions, and respectful treatment of all patients," she says. Reisner has had a particular focus on reducing Black maternal mortality, which in Washington state is twice the rate than for white women, even with the state's mandate for access during pregnancy. (The mortality rate for Black mothers nationally is threefold higher than for white women.)
</p>
<p>
Suicide and postpartum overdoses are major contributors to Black maternal mortality. "Women with mental health and substance use disorders often are not respected, so we've had a very innovative addiction recovery program at Swedish with compassionate care basically as the core of the model," Dr. Reisner says. She adds that the fact that such an approach is even necessary is "sad, when you think about it."
</p>
<p>
Swedish has a program that includes doulas, trained professionals who serve as support for women during pregnancy, birth, and the postpartum period. "Many of them have come from disenfranchised communities, so [they] can relate to the patients," Dr. Reisner notes. "As an advocate with white skin, I can do my best, but someone with brown skin is not going to trust me as much because I don't share their same experience."
</p>
<p>
But as Dr. Reisner and other physicians point out, the progress to date still leaves a lot to be desired, Dr. Williams says.
</p>
<p>
"Even though medicine is getting better, we're still seeing the same disparities," she says. "You can make the argument that people are not only not getting the same level of care but are getting a worse level care."
</p>
<p>
The real challenge with addressing health disparities is that many of the factors that drive it happen outside the clinic. "We give this prescription in the clinic, but we don't then try in a meaningful way to address the ways patients experience the world when they leave the clinic," Dr. Williams says. "We need to recognize that there are certain diseases that need to be treated in a hospital setting, but a lot of problems are directly related to systemic racism."
</p>
<p>
Researchers have long documented the impact that social determinants of health—the conditions in which people are born, live, and work—have on outcomes. Now, the urgency of that work is gaining more recognition and acceptance. "There is greater regard for social determinants of health in embracing health equity in a systematic way," says Dr. Danielson. "Health care systems getting involved in social determinants is a health equity act."
</p>
<p>
Dr. Schaffrinna says that for those kinds of discussions to be successful, "we have to approach it not with blame, but 'How do we change?' " That means acknowledging up front that racism is a problem.
</p>
<p>
"Is there discrimination? Absolutely," he says. "We must confront it."
</p>
<p>
But he believes that medicine should also focus on how poverty is a driver of disparities.
</p>
<p>
"When you look at Americans suffering from the effects of poverty, it appears that all of them suffer," he says.
</p>
<p>
Even within the confines of the system, barriers exist, notably the chronic challenge of financing. Addressing health disparities costs money, such as Swedish's investment in doulas. Investing in such efforts is especially difficult when practices and medical systems are facing huge drops in revenue as a result of the pandemic.
</p>
<p>
"Everybody is recognizing that it's an issue, but no one is willing do anything," says Dr. Schaffrinna. "Most of the FQHCs are trying to begin the process of addressing social determinants, but there's no revenue coming in for that expense."
</p>
<p>
Moreover, some solutions have the potential to shift money away from the medical system altogether. "As a nation we spend an enormous amount of money on health care, and it's not giving us the biggest bang for buck," adds Dr. Schaffrinna. "We should put some of that money into addressing social determinant factors. Our country can't afford to do it all, and the only way to do it is to reallocate resources to other areas, similar to what people are saying about police departments." (Activists have been pushing for cities to invest in mental health workers as front-line respondents to individuals in crisis, instead of the police.)
</p>
<p>
The respect that society places on physicians offers them a special opportunity to play a role in tackling the problem of health equity. "Because we have by nature and profession a caring tendency and because we're interacting with patients who manifest all the effects of this social injustice, it positions us in a unique way to be the ones who also can bring awareness and advocacy for the need to make change," says Okechukwu Ojogho, MD, a transplant surgeon at Providence Medical Group in Spokane.
</p>
<p>
The really thorny question is the extent to which medicine is willing to broaden the conversation about health equity to racism, including institutional racism in medicine. The profession is starting to recognize, as the New England Journal of Medicine said in a recent editorial, that "slavery has produced a legacy of racism, injustice, and brutality that runs from 1619 to present, and that legacy infects medicine as it does all social institutions."
</p>
<p>
Dr. Williams says that the current conversation about racism reveals some long-standing assumptions about medicine. "We've done a disservice to medicine as an entity by attempting to exist as an apolitical, neutral entity," she says. "We have for a long time felt that we're altruistic human beings who are neutral and somehow colorblind, and in doing so, we have blinded ourselves to the root causes that perpetuate the health outcomes we see."
</p>
<p>
Ultimately, the profession has to have a painful conversation about racism if it is going to conquer health disparities, Dr. Danielson says.
</p>
<p>
"I'm hoping a health equity conver- sation is not a substitute for a conversation about racism," he says. "You can do a whole lot toward health equity without changing any power paradigm. You can still hold all the strings and be in a position of power and do more things to promote health equity. An anti-racism perspective has built into it a pretty strong power shift."
</p>
<p>
How much change happens depends on doctors themselves, says Dr. Danielson.
</p>
<p>
"I would imagine a lot of us are on the edge of our seats right now," he says. "Will this really be a transformational time? It would be too bad if people sit on their seats and wait for something external to show them it's time to move forward. Moving forward is the thing we need to do, not the thing we wait for someone else to do."
</p>
<p>
Dr. Williams says that just a year ago, something like the march would have been impossible to imagine. But one conversation with another doctor that she had at the event stood out. In her speech at the march, Dr. Williams noted that "we scrutinize all our actions in the hospital to minimize harm to patients, but we don't consider actions in our greater community with the same scrutiny." The physician that Dr. Williams spoke to had never considered this.
</p>
<p>
"Hearing that physician declare that their eyes were opened showed me that we did something good that day," Dr. Williams says. "And if we opened just a few more eyes, we can do something good for many more lifetimes to come."
</p>
<p>
<em>John Gallagher is a freelance journalist who specializes in health care issues. He is a regular contributor to WSMA Reports.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the Sept/Oct. 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter.</em>
</p>
</div> | 8/31/2020 10:32:10 AM | 8/31/2020 10:22:40 AM | 8/31/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| faith_through_action | Faith Through Action | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/August/faith_through_action | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/WSMA-Reports-Sept-Oct-Article-Image-645x425px%20(002).jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports September-October 2020 cover" /></div>
<h5>August 31, 2020</h5>
<h2>Faith Through Action</h2>
<p>
By Milana McLead
</p>
<h5><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></h5>
<p>
If you ask what he was like as a child, Nathan Schlicher, MD, answers with a smile, and says, "I was probably a precocious kid."</p>
<p>
That might be an understatement, considering he skipped first, fourth, seventh, and ninth grades, graduated from high school at 14, skipped a year of college, completed law school a year early, and started medical school at 19. “It was normal to me, as crazy as that sounds,†he says.
</p>
<p>
Perhaps that was because a strong, bright family grounded him and kept him humble. “My grandfather was a brilliant physician,†Schlicher says. “He taught me early on: ‘You may be very successful, but there’s probably somebody who’s done it faster, younger, smarter. Don’t get hung up on yourself. Be happy with who you are and try not to make anyone feel any different.’ â€
</p>
<p>
His father, Peter, was a hospital administrator and his mother, Carol, a nurse, so medicine was ever-present in the household. “We grew up talking about medicine and enjoying stories around the dinner table,†he says. “Since my dad wasn’t clinical, my mom would try to gross him out. We all had a great time with that.â€
</p>
<p>
While Dr. Schlicher’s intellect and relative youth are front and center, one quickly learns that a strong faith and a deep passion for service are at his core.
</p>
<p>
An early mentor and Methodist minister known as “Big David†solidly influenced his teen years. “Big David was a good man who lived the message and cared for the people. He was open, loving, and kind, and very much believed in faith through actions,†Dr. Schlicher says. “I try to live as he did in terms of doing what I can for the community; remembering that faith is not words, but actions; and the importance of caring for others.â€
</p>
<p>
A career in medicine was the perfect companion for that framework for life. “I grew up volunteering and always knew that medicine would be part of my life. And emergency medicine—to be able to make a difference, to be there at some of the most challenging times of people’s lives—I love being there in the moments when it matters so much,†he says.
</p>
<p>
If anything keeps him awake at night—at least on the nights he’s not working in the ER at CHI Franciscan’s St. Joseph Medical Center—it’s unsolvable problems. “If I feel like I missed an opportunity to make a difference, to solve a problem I could have had an impact on—my mind churns on ‘What should I have done differently? What could we have done differently?’ We do the best we can, we plan ahead, and think through every scenario to get the right answer. Sometimes it works, sometimes you fail, but you learn and try not to repeat those mistakes.â€
</p>
<p>
Problem-solving comes naturally to Dr. Schlicher, as does taking the lead in finding solutions. Observe that your patients need a voice in the Legislature? Solution: Seek and win appointment to an open seat in the Washington State Senate, and serve as a state senator advocating for effective health care policy. See a need to reduce preventable emergency room visits? Solution: Create an “ER is for Emergencies†campaign that shifted behavior and perceptions about seeking care in the ER.
</p>
<p>
Need to encourage better opioid prescribing behaviors while protecting patients from highly addictive medications? Solution: Design “Better Prescribing, Better Treatment†program as a peer-to-peer, non-punitive initiative that has reduced opioid prescribing
in Washington state, with more than 20,000 prescribers in 50+ health systems participating in the program.
</p>
<p>
Impatient with inaction—a side effect of his life in emergency medicine—Dr. Schlicher’s inner drive to make things better compels him to lead and to step up where needed. “I very much try to live the philosophy that we are going to do things,†he says. “I think that’s what we need to work on in medicine—it’s not just showing up, it’s leading.â€
</p>
<p>
His leadership philosophy serves him well in the ER, in advocacy, and in the WSMA. “It’s important that you listen to the people you’re working with—a leader is a team member. It’s not just leading the team, it’s inspiring them, working to hear their thoughts, and building relationships,†he says. “That comes through listening and having a vision of where you’re going and communicating that vision well.â€
</p>
<p>
He steps into his role as president of the WSMA at an unprecedented time. The impact of COVID-19 has shaken the house of medicine especially hard; Dr. Schlicher sees that as one of the big issues ahead. “COVID is a window into all the dysfunctions in medicine,†he notes. “It’s a lens into the systemic structural problems of health care. That strain on the system is challenging, but it offers us an opportunity to bring positive change for better access to health care, better health systems, and better environments for clinicians to practice in.â€
</p>
<p>
He sees a connection between the issues uncovered by the pandemic and an associated opportunity to improve physician wellness. “The things likely to drive us to burnout are the systemic structural problems, poorly designed EMRs, lack of backup and support, and being asked to do things outside of our scope or abilities,†he says. “We need to build a better work environment to help people be happier in all parts of their lives. If you do it right, people are happy.â€
</p>
<p>
As he leads the work of the WSMA in the year ahead, his focus will be on improving access to health care, physician wellness, and driving quality. And he sees the WSMA as the conduit to making positive change happen. “Physicians need to lead health care because we see it through a clinician’s lens. If you don’t have that, there’s a knowledge deficit in leadership. We need to grow the next generation of trailblazers so that physicians are leading the health systems, regulatory entities, and in Olympia. Physicians need to be at the tables where decisions are made so our voice is heard, and that’s what you support when you join the WSMA.â€
</p>
<p>
<em>Milana McLead is WSMA senior director, strategic communications and growth, and editorial director of WSMA Reports.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the Sept/Oct. 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter.</em>
</p>
</div> | 8/31/2020 11:14:07 AM | 8/31/2020 10:29:46 AM | 8/31/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| the_unseen_covid_19_risk_factor | The Unseen COVID-19 Risk Factor | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/August/the_unseen_covid_19_risk_factor | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/WSMA-Reports-Sept-Oct-Article-Image-645x425px%20(002).jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports September-October 2020 cover" /></div>
<h5>August 31, 2020</h5>
<h2>The Unseen COVID-19 Risk Factor</h2>
<p>
By Pat Curry
</p>
<h5><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></h5>
<p>
With a high-desert climate and rich, volcanic soil, the Yakima Valley is one of the most important agricultural regions in the country. More than 1.7 million acres in Yakima County are farmland, producing 21% of the state's agriculture sales, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
</p>
<p>
It is also has been one of the nation's COVID-19 hot spots; in May, Yakima County had the highest case rate of any county on the West Coast, according to the Institute for Disease Modeling in Bellevue.
</p>
<p>
According to July data from the Washington State Department of Health, Hispanics make up 13% of the state's population, but had accounted for 44% of the state's confirmed COVID-19 cases and 29% of its hospitalizations.
</p>
<p>
In Yakima County, about 55% of the COVID-19 patients are Hispanic, says Bismark Fernandez, MD, an internal medicine physician and hospitalist at Virginia Mason Memorial who has been working in the COVID-19 unit for several months. That number is probably low, he says, because about 20% of their patients don't report their ethnicity.
</p>
<p>
Dr. Fernandez has seen a recurrent pattern that might contribute to the higher rate of infection in Hispanic patients, he says.
</p>
<p>
"Many have told me that often, family members or friends don't always believe this is a real pandemic; or if they believe it, they are not always aware how easily the virus can spread or how serious this pandemic is," Dr. Fernandez says. "If they don't always believe it or are not made aware of how the virus can spread or how severe the pandemic really is, they may not always follow the safety measures we try to implement. That puts their family members and coworkers at risk. We're trying to educate them; labs and CT scans won't lie."
</p>
<p>
(These problems seem to be improving as Virginia Mason Memorial health care leaders have voiced their concerns and educated the public through various media outlets about the importance of universal masking, adequate hand hygiene, social distancing, and staying at home when sick. In July, Yakima was cited as one of the metro areas where new COVID-19 deaths are decreasing most.)
</p>
<p>
The patient demographic Dr. Fernandez has seen is being repeated across the state. A July report from the DOH said "the impacts of COVID-19 morbidity and mortality have not been felt equally by all populations in Washington state. The pandemic has exacerbated the underlying and persistent inequities among historically marginalized communities and those disproportionately impacted due to structural racism and other forms of systemic oppression."
</p>
<p>
When adjusted for age, Hispanic people and Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islanders have infection rates nine times higher than white people. Blacks and American Indian or Alaska Native case and hospitalization rates are three times higher than those of whites, the report says.
</p>
<p>
The Cross Cultural Health Care Program is a Seattle nonprofit training and consulting organization founded to advance access to quality health care that is culturally and linguistically appropriate. Bryon Lambert, the organization's director of equity and inclusion, says he's "not surprised that people of color are succumbing to COVID-19 at much higher rates than their white counterparts."
</p>
<p>
The work of the CCHCP is getting "a lot more interest in the wake of the protests of the killing of George Floyd while in police custody." Lambert notes that health equity requires health care leaders to recognize that systems have their own cultures and biases that can create issues for patients.
</p>
<p>
"One of the big misconceptions we try to dispel is when people believe it's the patients who are non-compliant or don't seek care, or don't eat healthy or are doing all these things to themselves," he says. "We kind of flip it. We help them understand that the institutions that are designed with the intention of helping people often can be unintentionally amplifying disparities."
</p>
<p>
Jeff Duchin, MD, the local health officer for Seattle and King County, is another health care leader who says the numbers are not unexpected.
</p>
<p>
"It's been an ongoing national tragedy and shame that we have communities of color throughout our country suffering disproportionate adverse health impacts from a wide variety of health conditions," Dr. Duchin told a Seattle Times reporter.
The reasons for the disparities are numerous and long-standing. A recent interview in Scientific American with public health specialist and physician Camara Phyllis Jones, MD, MPH, PhD, goes as far as to say that racism, not race, is a risk factor for dying of COVID-19. A former medical officer and director of research on health equity at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Jones says racism has increased exposure to the virus for people of color, given them less protection from it, and burdened them with chronic illnesses, such as diabetes and hypertension, that put them at high risk.
</p>
<p>
People of color are more exposed to the virus, Dr. Jones says, because of residential and educational segregation that leads to limited job opportunities, crowded housing conditions, and overrepresentation in prisons and jails. Testing sites for the virus have tended to be located in more affluent neighborhoods or in drive-in locations that require having a car.
</p>
<p>
Some of those scenarios are familiar to Dr. Fernandez in Yakima. Many of his Hispanic COVID-19 patients are living in very small dwellings with a large number of family members. If one person has symptoms, it's difficult to self-isolate.
</p>
<p>
Because they work in lower-paying jobs, they don't stay home or go to the doctor when they're sick.
</p>
<p>
"The symptoms are very broad and can be very mild, so they continue to go to work," Dr. Fernandez says. "One of the reasons they continue to work is they don't get sick benefits. They can't afford to miss 10 days of work. But by doing that, they're putting their co-workers and their family members at high risk."
</p>
<p>
People of color also tend to work in jobs that can't be done from home. The study by the Institute for Disease Modeling noted that in Yakima County, 14% of the population works in agriculture, forestry, fishing, and hunting, jobs which require leaving the house. In King County, the top employment category is professional/technical jobs that often can be done remotely.
</p>
<p>
"Our community has been fortunate to receive the highest quality care possible for everyone that has needed it," Dr. Fernandez says.
</p>
<p>
Virginia Mason Memorial has been working hard to make the public aware that race, financial status, or immigration status "won't keep you from getting high- quality care. We don't refuse anyone."
</p>
<p>
<em>Pat Curry is WSMA Reports' senior editor.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the Sept/Oct. 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter.</em>
</p>
</div> | 8/31/2020 10:34:15 AM | 8/31/2020 10:27:03 AM | 8/31/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| white_coats_for_black_lives | White Coats for Black Lives | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/August/white_coats_for_black_lives | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/WSMA-Reports-Sept-Oct-Article-Image-645x425px%20(002).jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports September-October 2020 cover" /></div>
<h5>August 31, 2020</h5>
<h2>White Coats for Black Lives</h2>
<p>
By John H. Vassall II, MD
</p>
<h5><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></h5>
<p>
I was gratified to join with thousands of masked colleagues in a recent march from Harborview Medical Center to Seattle City Hall in support of the struggle against racism. This felt different than when I participated in a march across the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, Alabama, on the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, or when I first tasted tear gas during the March on Washington in my college days.
</p>
<p>
The size and diversity of the crowds and the depth of the conversations were greater than in the past. Systemic racism and the oppression of people of color was acknowledged, not defensively denied.
</p>
<p>
Yet discussions of "social determinants of health" can deflect attention from racism in medicine and health care delivery. James Marion Sims, the "father of modern gynecology," developed his surgical techniques after experimental surgery without anesthesia on enslaved women. The Tuskegee syphilis study, in which Black men were observed as a deadly, treatable disease ravaged their bodies, has left a legacy of mistrust of American medicine among many African Americans. To this day, biomedical corporations continue to reap billions of dollars from HeLa cells, cancerous cells used in research that were removed and cloned from the cervix of a Black woman named Henrietta Lacks taken without her knowledge or consent; Henrietta and her family were not compensated.
</p>
<p>
How might we address racism in medicine? We can learn from our efforts to address safety in medicine. In 1999, the Institute of Medicine issued its landmark report, "To Err Is Human: Building a Safer Health System," documenting that 44,000 to 98,000 people each year died in American hospitals because of preventable medical errors.
</p>
<p>
Like many of my colleagues, my reaction was denial. I was a practicing primary care physician dedicating every day of my life to healing. I refused to believe that I could be responsible for the unnecessary death of my patients.
</p>
<p>
But when I studied the literature, I came to understand that unsafe policies and procedures, a hierarchical culture, and lack of error-prevention skills made hospitals dangerous environments. To prevent needless deaths from errors and to make substantive change, I came to the painful realization that I was putting my patients at risk with every hospital admission. Despite my best intentions and doing everything I was trained to do, I almost certainly must have had patients who died in my care from an error I did not recognize.
</p>
<p>
As with systemic safety issues, so it is with systemic racism. It may be difficult to see, but it still causes harm.
</p>
<p>
What should we do? Make it personal. We can do everything in our power to make health care safer or we remain complicit with unsafe conditions; there is nothing in between. We can either do everything in our power to recognize and deconstruct racism or remain complicit with racism. There is no other choice.
</p>
<p>
Become educated about systemic racism. Racist ideas, policies, and practices have been developed, entrenched, and refined over hundreds of years. They are inculcated in culture and are self-perpetuating. They will not change without intention and effort, just as hospitals became safer only after systemic changes and education of physicians, all hospital workers, and patients about recognizing and mitigating unsafe practices and behaviors.
</p>
<p>
Act. Have brave, respectful conversations that focus on the system and the problem, not the people. With faith in ourselves and in our collective humanity, we can and will prevail against racism if we continue the effort we've started.
</p>
<p>
<em>John H. Vassall II, MD, is CEO of the Foundation for Health Care Quality and serves as a WSMA trustee.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the Sept/Oct. 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter.</em>
</p>
</div> | 8/31/2020 10:32:33 AM | 8/31/2020 10:28:26 AM | 8/31/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| quality_improvement_put_to_the_test | Quality Improvement Put to the Test | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/July/quality_improvement_put_to_the_test | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img alt="WSMA Reports: July/August 2020 issue cover" src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/COVER-WSMA_JulyAug-2020-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" /></div>
<h5>July 2, 2020</h5>
<h2>Quality Improvement Put to the Test</h2>
<p>
By Rita Colorito
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
At 8 p.m. on Feb. 28, Jeff Tomlin, MD, CEO of EvergreenHealth in Kirkland, received the news he'd been dreading. Ettore Palazzo, MD, the chief medical and quality improvement officer, confirmed that Evergreen had its first case of COVID-19.
</p>
<p>
Evergreen had been on alert since Jan. 20, after The Everett Clinic, some 20 miles north, reported the first U.S. case of the novel coronavirus. Evergreen recorded the state's first COVID-19 patient death on Feb. 29. That same day, Gov. Jay Inslee declared a state of emergency.
</p>
<p>
Within 30 minutes, Evergreen activated its incident command system and sent its administration team to literally take the information to the front lines, an approach based on its belief that quality improvement needs to filter from leadership to teams to empower them to develop solutions that work.
</p>
<p>
Dr. Tomlin was dispatched to the obstetrics floor, where nurses asked what they would do with expecting mothers and their families who may have COVID-19. "The staff weren't panicked. They were in problem-solving mode right away," says Dr. Tomlin. Two weeks later, obstetrics admitted a pregnant woman with fever and flu-like symptoms. "Thanks to that discussion, we had a structure in place to deal with that. It's an example of leadership being present and learning from the front-line staff," he says.
</p>
<p>
Evergreen's response to the challenge flowed from the guiding principles of its quality improvement program—absolute safety, effective care, and service to the patient, says Dr. Tomlin. Like other health care providers throughout the state, Evergreen's QI infrastructure has been both validated and challenged by the rapidly unfolding pandemic. The lessons learned, say Drs. Tomlin and Palazzo and other QI leaders, will carry them not only through this crisis and others, but also in their day-to-day quest for quality improvement.
</p>
<h3>Preparation determines response</h3>
<p>
Beginning with the worldwide SARS outbreak in 2003, and the threats of H1N1 in 2009 and Ebola in 2014-16, pandemic preparedness has become an increasing concern of U.S. health care systems.
</p>
<p>
For the last decade, EvergreenHealth has participated in the Northwest Healthcare Response Network, a coalition focused on building a disaster-resilient health care system. Through NHRN, 200 of Evergreen's QI and leadership staff have attended all-hazards training at the CDC's Center for Preparedness and Response in Alabama. UW Medicine and Seattle Children's are also NHRN members.
</p>
<p>
"Your response is completely dependent on your preparation," says Dr. Tomlin. "It doesn't have to be a pandemic. If you don't have some of these systems in place to respond to any disaster... if you haven't thought of them in advance, your response is going to be delayed. And it's going to add uncertainty within your staff."
</p>
<p>
Over the Cascades and 150 miles east of Seattle, Confluence Health activated its incident command on March 1, bracing for the worst. Three days later, Confluence recorded its first coronavirus case. The processes put in place early on prepared for the surge that came two weeks later, says CEO Peter Rutherford, MD.
</p>
<p>
As nursing home cases and deaths increased in Kirkland, Confluence dispatched a palliative medicine rapid response team to local skilled nursing and assisted living facilities, adult family homes, jails, and homeless shelters. The focus was on teaching isolation measures and ensuring personal protective equipment in those facilities was adequate. "That really shut down outbreaks in those facilities and really saved us," says Dr. Rutherford.
</p>
<p>
The palliative team also provided advance care planning that helped prevent the system from being overwhelmed, says Rachel Reeg, MD, a Confluence hospitalist and a member of WSMA's board of trustees.
</p>
<p>
Making sure health systems have the necessary resources to adequately treat patients while protecting staff remains a top concern around COVID-19. Confluence's ethics committee changed the focus of its regularly scheduled meeting to address a potential resource shortage, says Dr. Reeg, the committee's vice chair since March.
</p>
<p>
"We knew that many COVID patients would require intensive care. Our main response was preparing to coordinate crisis standards of care with regional and state committees, and then introducing the organization to the idea of crisis management and allocation of scarce resources through our virtual meetings," she says.
</p>
<h3>Communication and transparency matter</h3>
<p>
"Nature abhors a vacuum. And if you don't fill that with facts, it will get filled with rumor and innuendo and that's incredibly destructive," says Dr. Rutherford.
</p>
<p>
Soon after its founding in 2013, Confluence's board of directors passed its first QI policy known as Speak Up, which encourages staff to voice any concerns regarding quality or safety to address problems in the moment, if possible. "That really set us up pretty well to move forward when this whole COVID endemic and then pandemic got started," says Dr. Rutherford.
</p>
<p>
Specialists and other providers at Confluence have felt freed to do what they need to do, says Dr. Reeg. "Our organization has been extremely supportive of individual responses and willingness to help. A lot of people have been happy for the opportunity to contribute," she says.
</p>
<p>
Communication and transparency breed trust, says Dr. Tomlin, a necessary component to keeping staff committed to the mission. "Having good quality improvement systems in place is important. But perhaps the most important aspect of those systems is 'have you developed the trust and collaboration with the groups that you are leading?' " he says. "If the staff doesn't have trust and a sense that you are working closely with the front lines to keep everyone safe, then it's hard to ask them to put themselves in harm's way."
</p>
<p>
Effective risk communication— understanding how best to share information to not only health care workers, but also the public and the press—has proven critical for developing that trust, says John Lynch, MD, MPH, an associate medical director at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.
</p>
<p>
"Every infectious disease doc out there, because of the work we do, needs to be prepared in how we communicate to our facilities and colleagues," says Dr. Lynch. He also recommends that all doctors have a knowledge of incident command (IC) structure. "Especially with a novel pandemic, it's like an earthquake every day, so it's important for every doctor to have some sort of knowledge on their role in IC," he says.
</p>
<p>
As the urgency grew at the end of February, Dr. Lynch, a University of Washington associate professor, was asked to lead the clinical response across the UW system. He and a team of 15 infectious disease, infection prevention and control, employee health, and QI experts spent the first two months working more than full time, seven days a week, almost exclusively on the crisis response. They provided guidance and support, but also empowered and relied on front-line staff to develop protocols and policies that made sense for them.
</p>
<p>
The knowledge and credibility of these physicians have been the important leadership qualities needed to steer the UW system through the crisis, says Dr. Lynch. "The other doctors know we're there to offer support, not to hold data against them when they start seeing infections."
</p>
<p>
Dr. Lynch says he also learned the value of well-being when it comes to managing a pandemic. At the request of Patricia Kritek, MD, Ed.M., a UW critical care and pulmonary physician, Dr. Lynch joined a weekly virtual town hall to field questions from front-line workers worried about the unknowns of the virus and looking for support and answers.
</p>
<p>
The town halls average about 500 participants; one topped 1,000 people. "Taking an extra hour felt like a huge
ask at the time when there was so much other emergency stuff going on, but it was absolutely the right thing to do," he says.
</p>
<h3>Rethinking improvement</h3>
<p>To prepare for any crisis, quality improvement needs to be a continual process, says Dr. Palazzo. In September 2019, months before the coronavirus appeared in China, EvergreenHealth's infection control and QI team began meeting monthly to review its pathogen response policies and protocols.
</p>
<p>
"It had been several years since we had performed a comprehensive review of our High Consequence Infectious Disease Pathogen protocol," says Dr. Palazzo. "When this all hit us in late February, we were fortunate that we didn't have to dust off any books on how to move areas to negative airflow or to cohort patients. It literally had been worked on the months ahead of time and that really put us in a good position when we got our first cases."
</p>
<p>
While cost-benefit analysis factors into any QI program, COVID-19 caused financial considerations to take a back seat, says Dr. Rutherford, as health care systems halted elective surgeries and procedures to flatten the curve.
</p>
<p>
"We took a perspective at the beginning of this that, as an organization, we were going to do the right thing for the community and deal with the financial impacts later; that having money in the bank in a broken care system later wasn't where we wanted to be," says Dr. Rutherford. Feeling freed from the financial considerations helped Confluence get a handle on the virus quickly, he says.
</p>
<p>
The virus forced action on both immediate and long-term needs. Within a week, Confluence had converted its entire third floor to negative pressure. And it finally implemented telehealth capabilities, after years of discussing it.
</p>
<p>
Despite the financial hit from COVID-19, Dr. Rutherford sees a silver lining going forward. "These aren't things that will go away. They are now done. They are part of our organization," he says. "It's really just, let the right people lead it. Let them do their piece."
</p>
<p>
<em>Rita Colorito is a freelance journalist who specializes in covering health care. She is a regular contributor to WSMA Reports.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/2/2020 12:04:12 PM | 7/2/2020 11:11:56 AM | 7/2/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| small_steps_to_wellness | Small Steps to Wellness | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/July/small_steps_to_wellness | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img alt="WSMA Reports: July/August 2020 issue cover" src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/COVER-WSMA_JulyAug-2020-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" /></div>
<h5>July 2, 2020</h5>
<h2>Small Steps to Wellness</h2>
<p>
By Pat Curry
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
When health care leaders pay attention to quality improvement, physician wellness is a beneficiary.
Virginia Mason saw an example of this with one of its early QI efforts: standardizing exam rooms in the outpatient primary care department.That meant finding out what was in the rooms and talking to clinicians to find out what they needed at their fingertips to do their jobs well, says Carrie Horwitch, MD, an internal medicine physician at Virginia Mason Medical Center.
</p>
<p>
"Now, I know any room I go into anywhere in my section is the same. I can find anything I need in my room; I don't have to go looking for things."
</p>
<p>
It may seem like a small thing, but it means physicians can give better care to their patients. When systemic failures keep doctors from doing it, it contributes to what many refer to as burnout. Dr. Horwitch prefers the term "moral distress" or "moral injury."
</p>
<p>
"If I can't do my work well to care for my patients, that causes distress to me as a physician because that is my obligation," Dr. Horwitch says. "The tenor of an organization comes from its leaders. If they value, respect, and truly care for the people who work for them, you'll have more engagement and, I think, less moral distress."
</p>
<p>
It's essential, Dr. Horwitch says, for health care leadership to not only have skill in the financial areas of medicine, but also to have compassion for the people doing the caregiving. "Emotional intelligence is really important and it needs to be taught to head leadership and middle management leadership as well," she says.
</p>
<p>
The value of quality improvement on physician wellness became extraordinarily apparent during the COVID-19 pandemic, when Virginia Mason was able to make what seemed like an "overnight transition from in- person to virtual visits," Dr. Horwitch says. "We turned something that could have been a several-months project into a couple weeks, making sure we could take care of our patients and keep ourselves safe."
</p>
<p>
For her, the rapid implementation of telehealth was evidence that Virginia Mason cared about her well-being.
</p>
<p>
"It made me feel valued making sure we have adequate protective equipment and having systems in place to keep us safe," she says. "It made me feel very good."
</p>
<h3>Broken systems</h3>
<p>
Edward Walker, MD, MHA, who just retired from a 40-year career at the University of Washington, works on the connection between leadership, quality improvement, and physician wellness. As a former senior medical executive and psychiatrist, he has coached physician leaders in the art of self- and organizational transformation as a pathway to wellness. One of the ways physicians can become distressed is working within systems that were not designed properly to support their effort, he says.
</p>
<p>
"Instead of telling our colleagues that they need to do mindfulness or yoga to deal with this stress, we should be helping them learn to transform their systems to support better care," he says. "When I see a distressed patient in clinic, the first thing I do is try to figure out whether the person is experiencing an abnormal reaction to a normal situation or a normal reaction to an abnormal situation.
</p>
<p>
"Quite often, physician burnout is an understandable and appropriate reaction to a very broken system," he says. "The solution to broken systems is quality improvement, and the key to quality improvement is leadership."
</p>
<p>
As lead educator for the WSMA, Dr. Walker has mentored nearly 1,000 individuals through its Physician Leadership Course. System transformation is a learnable skillset involving quality improvement, emotional intelligence, and community building; the skills taught in the course are invaluable to quality improvement and gaining buy-in from front-line physicians.
</p>
<p>
"I think some people approach quality improvement as a technical, analytic skill without fully understanding the leadership component and the connection to wellness," he says.
</p>
<p>
Leaders not only have to know what to do, but they have to build consensus around best practice standards and then "gently inspire and nudge" colleagues to follow and maintain those standards. Efficient and safe care is better for the patient, but it also feels better for the physician.
</p>
<p>
Physician-led systems have the advantage of designing work processes that are more directly influenced by the needs of the doctor-patient relationship and the ability of the physician to practice the art, as well as the science, of medicine.
</p>
<p>
"I've never met a physician who didn't feel fulfilled realizing he or she had done the absolute best for a patient," he says. "Quality improvement makes that possible."
</p>
<h3>The search for joy</h3>
<p>
Quality improvement and physician wellness is so vital to health care that the American Medical Association has a provider satisfaction, practice sustainability department. Its overall goal is to identify where "joy, purpose, and meaning can be possible for our health care professionals," says Kevin Taylor, MD, the AMA's director of organizational transformation.
</p>
<p>
"It sounds odd to have organizational transformation as part of a physician wellness program," Dr. Taylor says. "It's actually crucial to this kind of work. We understand there are major drivers of burnout and dissatisfaction or lack in meaning in your work. A good portion of that is the inefficiencies of our current workflow and the leadership culture in the systems we're part of."
</p>
<p>
Many evidence-based strategies can save physicians and care teams time that then can be devoted to their patient care. Dr. Taylor recommends the AMA StepsForward website, <a href="mailto:stepsforward.org">stepsforward.org</a>.
</p>
<p>
"There are dozens of modules that will enhance your clinical workflow and restore meaning in your work," he says.
</p>
<p>
Direct leaders of our physicians have a major influence on the culture of their health system and as a result, have an impact on their colleagues' sense of well-being and burnout. To help drive physician satisfaction, "leaders need to be active and visible; they need to actively listen, engage, and empower physicians to identify problems and help them to become part of the solution."
</p>
<p>
For many physicians, the health care culture has taken away their autonomy, choice, and agency. "Autonomy is an internal motivator for physicians," Dr. Taylor notes. "They want to have a voice in the system design and workflow but feel they are losing influence as the care delivery systems become more and more complex."
</p>
<p>
To be successful, physician leaders should take time to listen to their colleagues, give them the opportunity to identify the "pebbles in their shoes," and empower them to work with their teams to develop action plans that will improve their care delivery.
</p>
<p>
Physicians also need coaching on how to work collaboratively in a participative leadership style, he says. This is not a skill physicians learn in medical school, but they need it in the current health care environment where teams are so important. This requires new skills with process improvement and change management tools to effectively communicate and facilitate teams to achieve our mutual goals.
</p>
<p>
"You must be able to collaborate with your care teams to be successful in a clinically integrated network," Dr. Taylor says. "Participative leadership is the new reality for our physicians."
</p>
<p>
<em>Pat Curry is senior editor of WSMA Reports.</em>
</p>
<p><em>
This article was featured in the July/August 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter.</em>
</p>
</div>
<br />
<div class="telerik_paste_container" style="border-width: 0px; position: absolute; overflow: hidden; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">&nbsp;</div> | 7/2/2020 11:39:11 AM | 7/2/2020 11:19:14 AM | 7/2/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| the_crucible_of_covid_19 | The Crucible of Covid-19 | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/July/the_crucible_of_covid_19 | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/COVER-WSMA_JulyAug-2020-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" /></div>
<h5>July 2, 2020</h5>
<h2>The Crucible of Covid-19</h2>
<p>
By Nariman Heshmati, MD
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
When the first known COVID-19 patient in the United States was admitted to my local hospital, we quickly understood this would be a far-reaching battle that would surely involve many more patients.
</p>
<p>
As that case made national news, colleagues from around the country called, texted, and emailed asking how things were going in Washington state and how they could help. Even as they were reaching out, we were coordinating between health care systems, together trying to understand a path forward, to provide guidance to state officials, and to ensure we were prepared to take care of our communities.
</p>
<p>
When the epicenter of COVID-19 shifted to New York and overwhelmed their health care systems, soon I was calling, texting, and emailing those same physicians to see how they were faring. And as a practicing OB-GYN, I was shocked when I heard that New York hospitals were not allowing laboring women to have their partners be present with them. Obviously, one-to-one emotional support during labor is critical and can improve outcomes.
</p>
<p>
The day I read those news reports, I walked into an exam room to see one of my own patients. Terrified that she would be forced to give birth alone, she was considering a home birth. This, despite evidence that even low-risk home birth outcomes are worse than those in a hospital setting. As a high-risk pregnancy, she was last person who should deliver anywhere but in a resource-rich hospital prepared for emergencies. I reassured her that physician leaders overseeing labor units in Washington were supportive of having partners present during labor.
</p>
<p>
Ultimately, New York state reversed its policies and allowed laboring women to have partners present, but I wondered: What was the difference between Washington and New York? We faced the same crisis, but responded to it differently. The answer? Here in Washington, we relied more on physician leadership.
</p>
<p>
We've seen more clearly how physician leadership can make a difference as a result of the COVID-19 crisis. As physicians, being involved in leadership ensures that the future health care system is one in which our patients not only will receive the best care, but also one in which physicians want to practice. We can make a difference on a large scale even when not faced with a worldwide pandemic.
</p>
<p>
Studies show that health care systems with physician CEOs have improved quality and outcome measures over those that do not. Physicians bring a unique perspective when taking on leadership roles in health care organizations. We understand the struggles on the front line, we have been exhaustively trained to gather data and make rapid difficult decisions, and we view scenarios through the lens of clinical care.
</p>
<p>
Times of crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic can illuminate the shortcomings in our systems, but more importantly, they demonstrate our immense ability to adapt nimbly and respond to care needs in ways we could never otherwise imagine.
</p>
<p>
We also put our patients first. And my anxious patient? She had a beautiful and safe hospital birth with the support of her husband at her side.
</p>
<p>
<em>Nariman Heshmati, MD, is an OB-GYN at The Everett Clinic and serves as the secretary-treasurer on WSMA's executive committee.</em>
</p>
<p><em>
This article was featured in the July/August 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/2/2020 11:40:09 AM | 7/2/2020 11:19:18 AM | 7/2/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| controlling_the_cost_of_care | Controlling the Cost of Care | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/May/controlling_the_cost_of_care | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/COVER-WSMA_MayJune-2020-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports cover - May/June 2020" /></div>
<h5>May 5, 2020</h5>
<h2>Controlling the Cost of Care</h2>
<p>
By John Gallagher
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
Companies are always looking for ways to trim costs, so it's no wonder that health care is often on the top of the list. Employer-sponsored health insurance covers about half of the non-elderly population in the United States, but at a significant cost. The Kaiser Family Foundation estimates that the average family insurance premium is more than $20,000 a year. On average, workers in 2019 paid $6,015 toward the cost of family coverage, with employers paying the rest.
</p>
<p>
For years, some employers have tried to manage the financial burden by sharing more of it with their employees. Employee share of premium costs has risen more than 70% in the past 10 years. High-deductible plans were introduced on the grounds that workers with more skin in the game would be better health care consumers. (In fact, studies show the plans lead to a decrease in high-value care for patients.)
</p>
<p>
The approach invariably created a backlash. "One of the reasons I think this has become more acute is the cost of a care episode has become more transparent with high-deductible plans," says David Grossman, MD, senior medical director for community health and external relations at Kaiser Permanente Washington. "The cost is hitting consumers in the face. High-deductible plans have unleashed a lot of concerns."
</p>
<p>
Having failed to curtail their health care costs so far, employers are now looking to a new target to save money: physicians. According to a Jan. 13 article in Modern Healthcare, employers are "eyeing more aggressive measures to counter the formidable market power of consolidated hospitals and physician groups."
</p>
<p>
The COVID-19 epidemic may only make that pressure worse. Faced with severe financial losses due to the economic downturn, companies will be increasingly desperate to squeeze every possible savings they can from their expenses.
</p>
<p>
However, making cost the primary driver for decision-making about health care is short-sighted at best, even in light of the epidemic. While costs are driving the conversation, the real issue is the way the system is structured. Employers can help make the necessary changes in collaboration with physicians.
</p>
<p>
"If you're talking about reducing the cost of care, you need comprehensive change," says Jennifer Hanscom, executive director and CEO of the WSMA. "It's not an easy fix. The concern about controlling costs, while important, could unfairly single out physicians and overlook other drivers of cost."
</p>
<h3>The search for solutions</h3>
<p>
Several public- and private-sector purchasers in Washington are pursuing innovative solutions that rely upon close collaboration with physicians. The Washington State Health Care Authority, which covers more than 2 million people through its Apple Health and state employee programs, has an ambitious goal: having 90% of health care it purchases be value-based, which rewards physicians and providers for the quality of care that they offer. State employees can choose from several value-based plans.
</p>
<p>
Along with the HCA, Boeing has been a pioneer in this effort. In 2014, it contracted directly with UW Medicine and Providence Health &amp; Services to offer a value-based plan for its employees. The HCA and Boeing plans promise not only lower costs for the employers, but a better patient experience for employees.
</p>
<p>
Capitation can offer a way out of the fee-for-service cycle that can perversely reward overuse. "Payment mechanisms like capitation are the way to go for the future," says Dr. Grossman.
</p>
<p>
Capitation is one way to solve the confusion inherent in the current payment system, agrees Philip Chan, MD, MHA, associate medical director for population health for UW Medicine/ Valley Medical Center. While the predominant fee-for-service system rewards physicians for the volume of care they provide, capitation rewards physicians for the quality of care they provide.
</p>
<p>
However, few employers are as large as the HCA and Boeing. Smaller and mid-size companies lack the size to create similar plans. Their interest may be more in cost savings and less in innovation. As a result, employers may be tempted to use a much blunter approach to saving money by creating narrow networks and slashing physician payments.
</p>
<p>
"We have to manage the problem of unintended consequences, such as the downside of narrow networks," says Hanscom. "Also, reducing reimbursements to physicians is a disincentive to participating in a plan, to say nothing of putting financial pressures on already struggling practices and contributing to physician burnout."
</p>
<h3>Targeting cost drivers</h3>
<p>
Considering physicians to be the problem and not the solution to health care costs overlooks a critical factor: Physicians know better where the waste is in the system and, as a result, where the savings lie.
</p>
<p>
For example, a local company came to Confluence Health in North Central Washington seeking help to reduce the number of workers using emergency departments for regular primary care. As it turned out, the main reason why employees were turning to the ED for routine care was that they were afraid of missing work during regular business hours.
</p>
<p>
Working with the company, Confluence set up a family practice clinic at the jobsite for employees and their dependents. The agreement provided Confluence with a bonus if it could reduce the company's total cost of care, while employees got incentives to improve their own health markers. As a result, ED visits declined by 25% and diabetic control measures improved by 40%.
</p>
<p>
Confluence's example highlights one of the main drivers of cost: overuse. "When it comes to total health care costs, two factors have to be addressed: utilization and unit price," says Dr. Grossman.
</p>
<p>
Simply ensuring clinical standards of care are followed more rigorously can lead to significant savings. "Utilization is the one thing we can tackle sooner than later," says Dr. Chan. "We have to try really hard to standardize our care and follow evidence-based clinical practice guidelines: If you're treating this, this should be your initial approach."
</p>
<p>
As for unit price—the measure of how much it costs to deliver a particular treatment or service—the current system provides no incentive to measure or control it.
</p>
<p>
"As a system, we don't understand what it costs to do things," says Edwin Carmack, MD, medical director for value-based care at Confluence Health. "We're the only business that doesn't know what it costs us to do something. We estimate based on what we get paid. What it costs us to do it, we don't know." A system in which physicians are responsible for the total cost of care would make that knowledge of unit cost essential and incentivize ways to control it.
</p>
<p>
Plenty of cost drivers are available for employers to target. Spending on drugs is high on the list.
</p>
<p>
"Having a tighter formulary can bring costs down a lot," says Dr. Grossman. "Ensure the right meds are going to the right people, not giving them too many drugs and expensive drugs unnecessarily."
</p>
<h3>Changing the system: a benefit for employers and physicians</h3>
<p>
As much as physicians are interested in employers moving toward a value- based system, they remain caught in a confusing world where fee-for-service is the primary system and demands are fragmented across different insurers.
</p>
<p>
"It is challenging working with various versions of value-based contracts," Dr. Chan notes. "The requirements and number of quality metrics vary among payers. This results in labor-intensive data reporting and tracking. It makes it harder to home in and focus on clinically important metrics that providers can actually control."
</p>
<p>
Ultimately, the question about how employers can cut costs should really be about how they can finally change the system for the better. Doing so will lead to the cost savings companies seek.
</p>
<p>
In the meantime, physicians remain stuck in a system that is always pushing for change, but never quite does.
</p>
<p>
"From the perspective of the physicians, they're still in two canoes: fee-for-service and value-based purchasing," says Hanscom. "For all the talk about innovation, we're not seeing enough of it."
</p>
<p>
<em>John Gallagher is a Washington state- based freelance journalist who specializes in covering health care.</em></p>
<p><em>
This article was featured in the May/June 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter. WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="[@]WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:21:36 AM | 5/5/2020 11:36:44 AM | 5/5/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| hope_in_the_time_of_covid_19 | Hope in the Time of COVID-19 | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/May/hope_in_the_time_of_covid_19 | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/COVER-WSMA_MayJune-2020-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports cover - May/June 2020" /></div>
<h5>May 5, 2020</h5>
<h2>Hope in the Time of COVID-19</h2>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
"As a species, we have coexisted and survived with an immense assortment of organisms, all pushing for a niche in which they, too, can flourish. We turn out to be fantastically resourceful - both in our physical and in our social structures. Each challenge results in subtle changes to our systems. SARS-CoV-2 is just the latest of these challenges, and it, too, will require us to adapt in ways that are likely to strengthen our resilience even more. Humanity will get through this fine, but we need to be willing to make major changes in how we function and behave until either we're through the pandemic or we have mass immunization available. Our past successes give me great optimism about our future." - <em>John Bramhall, MD, PhD</em>
</p>
<p>
"I am hopeful because I have seen teammates doing everything in their power to care for patients. Health care entities have collaborated in ways we would have never imagined - embracing technology to provide care in a matter of days instead of years. The way health care is delivered will be forever changed for the better. I am hopeful because I see compassionate people step forward to lend a helping hand. This crisis could have brought out the worst in us or the best in us - I am hopeful because it did the latter." - <em>Nariman Heshmati, MD</em>
</p>
<p>
"What brings me hope is that each generation of Americans is challenged with fears and despair, but always comes through. Some call this American exceptionalism. I call it the American people. We will work together to defeat the enemy, and you can take that to the bank." - <em>William K. Hirota, MD</em>
</p>
<p>
"Being at home with my daughter and seeing life through her eyes brings me hope. Being a doctor and mommy during these times is not easy. But looking to the future is what being a doctor mom is all about. Taking care of my patients, my work family, the residents I train, and my daughter is what brings me hope. Seeing us all come together... that brings me hope." - <em>Katina Rue, DO</em>
</p>
<p>
"I am given hope by two responses that, together, give our society the strength to get through this: neighbors looking for ways to help each other even at risk to themselves, and organizations getting past corporate inertia to respond rapidly and appropriately to a crisis." - <em>Tom Schaaf, MD, MHA</em>
</p>
<p>
"I find hope in my teammates in the emergency department where we see some of the darkest moments in people's lives. We provide compassion and hope to our patients, while caring for each other as a team. As we endure this season of COVID on the front lines, it is our ED family and those at home that help us through." - <em>Nathaniel Schlicher, MD, JD, MBA</em>
</p>
<p>
"I'm impressed by the generosity of our patients who are obviously feeling poorly and suffering from chronic illness but are willing to forgo or delay treatment so that others who are more urgent can get the care they need. Stressful and life-changing events like this bring out the best in people. I see that in my patients. I also see hope in everyone pulling together and getting the job done. In this crisis, we've learned to keep nimble and not make simple things overly complicated." - <em>Mika Sinanan, MD, PhD</em>
</p>
<p><em>
This article was featured in the May/June 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter. WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="[@]WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:22:59 AM | 5/5/2020 11:40:18 AM | 5/5/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| what_are_we_spending_on_health_care | What Are We Spending on Health Care? | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/May/what_are_we_spending_on_health_care | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/Newsletters/Reports/2020/COVER-WSMA_MayJune-2020-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports cover - May/June 2020" /></div>
<h5>May 5, 2020</h5>
<h2>What Are We Spending on Health Care?</h2>
<p>
By Pat Curry
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
When Washington State Rep. Eileen Cody started her career as a nurse more than 40 years ago, "insurance wasn't that big of a deal," she said. "A lot of people didn't have insurance. You could go into a hospital without being insured."
</p>
<p>
Today, with health care costs, insurance premiums, and out-of-pocket expenses higher than ever, some 400,000 Washingtonians are uninsured. For the tens of thousands more who buy insurance from the state's health benefit exchange, the out-of-pocket expenses are so high they can't afford to use it. It's insurance in name only. With the outbreak of COVID-19, access to high-quality, affordable health insurance is more important now than ever.
</p>
<p>
Cody, who represents the 34th Legislative District (Vashon Island, West Seattle, White Center, and Burien), chairs the House Health Care and Wellness Committee. The most senior Democrat in the state House of Representatives, she has been a state legislator since 1994; with her decades of medical experience, Cody is a health policy leader in Washington state's legislature.
</p>
<p>
WSMA Reports spoke with her about the recent legislative session and her vision for reducing health care costs in Washington state. The starting point for achieving that goal, Cody said, is getting a clear grasp of how much health care actually costs in the state. For that reason, she co-sponsored House Bill 2457 to establish a state health care cost transparency board.
</p>
<p>
The purpose of the board is to calculate and analyze information and trends related to all health care costs in Washington. The board also must annually establish the health care cost growth benchmark for increases in total health expenditures and analyze provider and facility cost increases. At press time, the bill had passed both houses of the Legislature and was awaiting Gov. Jay Inslee's signature.
</p>
<p>
"I'm trying to look at what we're really spending on health care across the state," Cody said. "It'd be nice to know what (health care) should cost. ... The CEO of a hospital said in front of our committee, 'Our billing has nothing to do with cost.' I've been saying that for 26 years! That's the problem."
</p>
<p>
With a goal of reducing health care costs for the state's residents, the first thing Cody said she would like to do is to raise the Medicaid reimbursement rate and to lower reimbursement on other health plans, namely those for teachers and state employees. The health care cost transparency board will provide the data to make a case for that.
</p>
<p>
The new panel, which will consist of public- and private-sector health insurance purchasers, will be responsible for annually calculating and releasing information on health care costs in Washington, including increases statewide for each health care provider, system, and payer. As in other states, the panel also will establish benchmarks for future health care cost increases and track expenditures against the annual benchmark. (The WSMA will nominate a physician to participate on an advisory committee that informs the panel's work.)
</p>
<p>
"First we need to find out what we're spending and then look at how it's spent," Cody said. "We don't know what people are paying. If we can get [information on] the spend, then we can see where the cost drivers are."
</p>
<h3>Gaining insight from other states</h3>
<p>
Washington is not the first state to tackle total cost of care or implement a method of tracking health care expenses. Massachusetts, which enacted a health care cost containment law in 2012, is furthest along, Cody said. They established a new agency, the Massachusetts Health Policy Commission, to oversee health care system performance and provide policy recommendations regarding health care delivery and payment system reform. Its sister agency, the Center for Health Information and Analysis, collects health care information from payers, providers, provider organizations, and third-party administrators and is a primary source of health care analytics that support policy development.
</p>
<p>
Cody said she doesn't want that kind of system for Washington state.
</p>
<p>
"In Massachusetts, they have a whole commission and did a whole big hoopla," she said. "I didn't want another agency looking at health care costs."
</p>
<p>
Data Washington state gets now from its all-payer claims database provide most pricing information but don't address total health care spending or the cost drivers behind the prices.
</p>
<p>
"The question has been raised how much is regulation driving cost," Cody said. "That's a little down the road. First, let's find out what we're spending and then we can look at how it's spent."
</p>
<h3>The public option compromise</h3>
<p>
Looking back on the 2019 session, Cody readily admits that the state's public insurance option—the nation's first, which is set to go into effect next year— diverged from what she proposed in her initial bill. That was a plan that capped reimbursement at Medicare rates. In the bill that ultimately passed and was signed into law, the state-sponsored plan will cap reimbursement to providers and facilities at 160% of Medicare.
</p>
<p>
"I always start out very aggressive knowing we'll have to compromise," she said. "The good thing is we have a standardized benefit package on the exchange. If nothing else happens, that's a good thing. It lowers the out-of-pocket expense and the deductible. That was outrageous; that's not really insurance."
</p>
<p>
The state estimates the standardized benefit package, coupled with the reimbursement cap, could lower premiums by 5-10%. That's not a huge savings, but given the massive premium increases on the health benefit exchange plans (35% in 2018), any drop in the premium would be cause for celebration. (The WSMA participated in public option negotiations throughout the 2019 session. We opposed the final bill due to concerns that physicians and health care facilities would not be able to contract to participate in the plan under the terms envisioned in the law, resulting in health plans that don't have adequate access to care for enrollees.)
</p>
<p>
The range of options being discussed at the state and national levels run from market-rate coverage to Medicare for All, "but there's no discussion about the rates," Cody said. "People still want choice, but they want everything for nothing and it just doesn't work too well that way.
</p>
<p>
"I think it's great to have the total cost of care discussion to own up to how much does it cost for things," she said.
</p>
<p>
Noting that prescription drug prices play a significant role in driving up health care costs, Cody noted that is one area that needs to be addressed at a federal level. It is ludicrous, she said, that the same drugs in other countries cost a fraction of the price than they do in the United States.
</p>
<p>
"The U.S. does the research and everyone enjoys that benefit," she said. "We can't allow that to continue."
</p>
<p>
State legislators passed a bill this session to cap the monthly out-of- pocket expense of insulin to $100 per month; at press time, that bill also was awaiting the governor's signature. Cody also favors legislation and/or regulation that would require insurers to apply prescription costs—and prescriptions bought using discount coupons—toward their customers' deductible and out-of- pocket expenses.
</p>
<p>
"It's ridiculous they aren't counting the cost of drugs toward the deductible," she said. She noted that her former patients, who had multiple sclerosis, needed prescription drugs that cost $7,000-$8,000 a month.
</p>
<h3>Paying doctors the right amount</h3>
<p>
Asked whether recent and proposed tax increases on physicians and health care entities, such as the business and occupation tax, run counter to the push to make health care more affordable, Cody said she agreed that it "doesn't help, necessarily. That's designed to make sure we have the next generation of doctors through college and practicing."
</p>
<p>
Given the opportunity to share what she wants Washington state doctors to know, Cody said, "We have to figure out how to get people paid the right amount of money for the work they do," she said. "It's wrong that doctors might get their bonuses from Press Ganey [patient satisfaction] scores. It tells them they can't say 'no' to a patient. That's not the way patient care should be measured. It should be patient outcomes. I appreciate a crusty doctor who does the right thing.
</p>
<p>
"In my 40 years as a nurse and 26 years as a legislator, I have seen a lot
of changes in health care," she said. "We still haven't made any headway
on [addressing the cost]. There used to be an incentive to order tests; now, it's the other way around. I personally like more global budgeting, which increases payment if you do a good job. It's very hard to make those kinds of changes."
</p>
<p>
<em>Pat Curry is senior editor of WSMA Reports.</em>
</p>
<p><em>
This article was featured in the May/June 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter. WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="[@]WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:24:04 AM | 5/5/2020 11:40:24 AM | 5/5/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| a_virtuous_cycle | A Virtuous Cycle | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/March/a_virtuous_cycle | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/News/Cover-WSMA_MarApril-2020-v6-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports cover" /></div>
<h5>March 4, 2020</h5>
<h2>A Virtuous Cycle</h2>
<p>
By Nicholas Rajacich, MD
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
I was surprised to hear a colleague express hesitation when I suggested that her practice, struggling with caseloads and administrative work, hire a physician assistant. After all, at my orthopedic practice, we were preparing to hire even more PAs (which will mean more than one PA per doctor).
</p>
<p>
For our practice, it's simple: PAs help us increase access to our services (more care for more people) and help manage many of our day-to-day tasks (fewer hours spent by our physician specialists on administrative work and less-complex procedures). Put even more simply, the bottom line is that our PAs are good for our practice's bottom line - both for patient care and practice revenue.
</p>
<p>
With most PAs trained in primary care, few come to us with experience or training in our surgical specialty. Some choose to do an additional year of specialized training, which we have found to be quite valuable. While it requires a significant commitment of time to train them both in the clinic and in the OR, the returns on this investment accrue rapidly.
</p>
<p>
For example: In the OR, our PAs prep the patients for surgery, handle the post-op orders, apply tourniquets during the operation and, in the case of a PA who's been around a while, close and dress incisions. Complicated patient discharges? Our PAs have us covered, arranging follow-up visits, DME prescriptions, and so on.
</p>
<p>
As their training moves along, and as the individual PA gains more experience, we give them expanded independence in our practice. With experience, we allow our PAs to see an independent panel of patients, saving the complex patients for our physicians.
</p>
<p>
And of course, a PA can do many of the tasks that doctors are being tasked with (more and more...and more) these days. With the development of EMRs and increasing regulatory requirements, there's a large burden of administrative material that a PA can help me with.
</p>
<p>
At this point, our investment in teaching these PAs has more than paid off. Our physicians are now freed up to practice at the highest level of our training and to see more new patients, which is a win-win for everyone.
</p>
<p>
We do at times allow PAs to run clinics offsite. In most situations when a PA is seeing patients in clinic, there is a physician available, either by phone (with the ability to review X-rays via PACs) or in person, to answer questions or provide advice as needed.
</p>
<p>
There are some relatively simple legal hurdles that one must address before hiring a PA, most of which can be navigated with the help of staff at the WSMA and the Washington Academy of Physician Assistants. Promising work is being done by those organizations at the state level to modernize the requirements around the PA delegation agreement - the document describing what training and supervision will be provided and what duties delegated to the PA. Ultimately, what's important is to clearly define and document the clinical partnership and to regularly revisit and revise as needed. This is key to building a successful physician-PA team and to ensure the highest quality of care for our patients.
</p>
<p>
At our practice, the use of PAs has led to greater access to care, which, in turn, has led us to hire more PAs (I envision a day when we may well have two PAs per doctor). It's a virtuous cycle if there ever was one, and one I'll continue to recommend to other physician colleagues.
</p>
<p>
<em>Nicholas Rajacich, MD, is a pediatric orthopedic surgeon at Mary Bridge Children's Orthopedic Clinic.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the March/April 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter. WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="https://wsma.org/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:25:19 AM | 3/4/2020 12:41:00 PM | 3/4/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| partnering_to_solve_the_health_care_puzzle | Partnering to Solve the Health Care Puzzle | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/March/partnering_to_solve_the_health_care_puzzle | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/News/Cover-WSMA_MarApril-2020-v6-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports cover" /></div>
<h5>March 4, 2020</h5>
<h2>Partnering to Solve the Health Care Puzzle</h2>
<p>
By Rita Colorito
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
Residents of rural Grays Harbor County know what it means to wait for health care. The coastal southwestern Washington community has one primary care physician for every 2,980 residents, compared to the statewide ratio of one physician for every 1,220 residents, according to a 2019 analysis by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Lack of access, among other factors, has taken its toll: The county ranks 36th of out 39 for overall health outcomes.
</p>
<p>
Working in an environment that's chronically underserved requires a collaborative approach to health care, says Ken Dietrich, MD, chief medical officer for Summit Pacific Medical Center in Elma. That's where physician assistants come in. These practitioners are nationally certified and licensed to prescribe medication and practice medicine in inpatient and outpatient settings in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
</p>
<h3>Improving access to care</h3>
<p>
To improve patient access to care, Summit takes a team-based approach, using non-physician practitioners such as physician assistants as primary care providers, or PCPs. Over the last decade, Summit has focused on recruiting PAs to fill the PCP gap. The use of these skilled and flexible practitioners, says Dr. Dietrich, is something medical centers and physician practices should consider.
</p>
<p>
"We tell patients we have all these PCPs; does it matter who they see? Oftentimes, they say, 'I just want to get in as soon as I can,' so that's really created an opportunity for us," he says.
</p>
<p>
Two kinds of patients need access to care, says Dr. Dietrich: those who don't have a primary care physician and those who do, but can't get in to see them. To accommodate in-paneled patients, a PA runs Summit's same-day clinic, serving as a conduit between the patient and their physician.
</p>
<p>
"Patients can get in when they need to and the PA communicates collaboratively with that patient's physician, if necessary," says Dr. Dietrich.
</p>
<p>
For rural communities such as Elma, PAs have proven to be an essential piece of the health care puzzle. They're also invaluable in urgent care, where reducing wait times is paramount regardless of geographic location, says Eileen Ravella, a PA-C with 36 years' experience who works in urgent care for Kaiser Permanente in Olympia.
</p>
<p>
"The flexibility of PAs helps with patient care and throughput," says Ravella, who also serves as the president of the Washington Academy of Physician Assistants. "I'm seeing all levels of acuity I'm comfortable with. I may see a complicated patient and work with physicians to get the patient admitted, do all the evaluations, and order tests. Or I may see the lesser acuity patients and the physicians may see the extremely complicated patients to help patient flow."
</p>
<h3>What collaboration looks like</h3>
<p>
Physicians who work with PAs say they help practices see more patients and provide continuity of care. Collaboration is at the core of the PAs role in health care.
</p>
<p>
"The collaboration looks different depending on the context, the geographic location, and the complexity of the patient," says Leah Yoke, PA-C, MCHS, who holds a joint appointment at the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance (SCCA) and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.
</p>
<p>
Yoke, who specializes in internal medicine and infectious disease, works in inpatient and outpatient settings in concert with oncologists and hematologists to diagnose, prevent, and treat infections in patients with cancer.
</p>
<p>
Cancer care centers also face a shortage of infectious disease physicians. Here, too, PAs can fill the gap, says Yoke, who promotes PA usage to cancer centers nationwide in her member ambassador role with the Infectious Diseases Society of America. For cancer patients, who often face a cascade of treatments and a dizzying number of specialists, PAs provide a familiar presence, says Yoke, as they are often the only provider who sees them across multiple treatments and teams.
</p>
<p>
"Typically, we're seeing really complex patients that have multiple comorbidities," says Yoke. "Because we don't have a ton of ID physicians, I'm able to see all the patients and help teams make decisions in a timely manner and provide some of that logistical legwork that we wouldn't otherwise be able to do."
</p>
<p>
"For the transplant service in particular, they're really a major piece of how cancer patients are cared for," says Steve Pergam, MD, MPH, an infectious disease faculty member and medical director of infection prevention at SCCA.
</p>
<p>
"We see patients together. We review cases together. But I think they've really allowed us to see more patients in our practice," says Dr. Pergam. "Because they're consistently on service whereas as doctors we're coming on and off service all the time, they have the ability to provide additional context and continuity for patient care."
</p>
<h3>At the top of everyone's profession</h3>
<p>
PAs also allow physicians and other PCPs to work at the top of their license to focus their energies on their most complex cases.
</p>
<p>
"In academic environments where we're often doing lots of things—research, teaching, and other responsibilities beyond just direct patient care—they are critical to our service. They communicate with teams directly and we often do a lot of shared decision-making, specifically for our complex patients," says Dr. Pergam, an associate professor in the division of allergy and infectious diseases at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle.
</p>
<p>
PAs practice in nearly every area of medicine, with approximately 50% providing primary care services. The next largest proportion, some 23%, focus on surgery or surgical subspecialties.
</p>
<p>
"The physician assistants I've been most familiar with definitely assist the entire team in being able to be more efficient in what we do," says Jeanne Poole, MD, a professor of medicine in the division of cardiology at UWSOM.
</p>
<p>
PAs can do a fair amount of high- level work alongside surgeons and proceduralists, says Dr. Poole. "We train them to be able to specialize and do portions of procedures, like sutures and getting access to venous systems."
</p>
<p>
Lyle Larson, PA-C, PhD, entered the field of cardiac electrophysiology in 1986 when it was a new subspecialty at the UW Medical Center in Seattle. Along with Dr. Poole, who was a new attending physician at the time, Larson helped build the practice into what it is today. In 2018, the two also co-edited the textbook "Surgical Implantation of Cardiac Rhythm Devices."
</p>
<p>
"It has been a positive, collaborative experience," says Larson. Because of his deep experience, Larson helps to teach electrophysiology fellows how to do the surgical aspects of pacemaker and defibrillator implantation. "When there are particularly difficult cases, the electrophysiologists expect and ask for me to be on their cases to assist them," he says.
</p>
<p>
Dr. Poole says highly experienced PAs such as Larson are integral to the cardiac electrophysiology practice. In the operating room, a PA's experience with complicated procedures, such as carefully implanting or removing cardiac rhythm devices and leads, makes the entire procedure safer, she says. "It's also an educational opportunity for young physicians who may not have had that same degree of experience."
</p>
<h3>The question of oversight</h3>
<p>
Despite the many positives, Ravella says PAs aren't being used to their fullest potential as a result of ongoing misconceptions.
</p>
<p>
"We're coming up against physicians who have real concerns about the perceived competition between physicians and PAs, and there is none. We can't practice without them. They are our team," says Ravella. "We're not here to replace physicians. We can't replace you. We are dependent practitioners."
</p>
<p>
Larson echoes that sentiment: "I'm certainly qualified to do procedures on my own, but that does not make me a surgeon. That does not make me an electrophysiologist. That makes me a very, very skilled PA who can function as a right-hand man for the physicians to take care of their patients."
</p>
<p>
Another barrier to utilization: the idea that PAs require direct supervision. In reality, PAs need minimal supervision, says Ravella.
</p>
<p>
At Summit, physicians are available if a PA has a question or concern, but they don't have to be there physically to provide oversight, says Dr. Dietrich. "Because we have such an integrative model, on a day-to-day basis, our PCPs are touching base with one another, connecting with patients, so there's a lot of collaborative care."
</p>
<p>
"Certainly, you don't have to have a physician right next to a physician assistant if they are working within the scope of their training," says Dr. Poole. "For procedures, that's different because you are really working as a team— multiple hands trying to accomplish a certain procedure."
</p>
<p>
PAs can and do serve as resources for others in the medical community. Larson and Yoke both work as teaching associates at the UW Medical Center. Dr. Dietrich says experienced PAs at Summit often serve as mentors for new doctors.
</p>
<p>
"Our PAs are highly expert, spending all of their time dealing with high- risk, immunocompromised patients," says Dr. Pergam. "Because they are so knowledgeable, they can be a great first resource for the teams to ask questions directly. And then the PA will come to us with the more complex questions."
</p>
<h3>Investing in the future</h3>
<p>
The approach to using PAs to their fullest credentialed potential needs to be well thought out, says Dr. Dietrich. Summit has a flat hierarchical structure. All team members go through initial onboarding and an external yearly peer review. This makes for a more effective, integrative, and collaborative approach to care, he says.
</p>
<p>
Summit typically hires experienced PAs, but about three years ago, it began adding PAs directly out of training. For these PAs, Summit provides a year- long residency-style program. While there's a lot of initial oversight, as these PAs gain experience and confidence, they are given more responsibility and eventually obtain their own panel of patients to manage.
</p>
<p>
"By investing in their training, you're investing in a resource who is hopefully going to stay with you," says Dr. Dietrich. "Can they see all complexity of patients? No. But they can see 75% of patients."
</p>
<p>
The investment has paid off. About 25% of Summit's PCPs are PAs. If a patient develops a complex diagnosis while under a PA's care, the PA consults with physicians or other PCPs, but they would continue to manage that patient's care, says Dr. Dietrich. "It's the right care by the right person at the right time."
</p>
<p>
It comes down to the breadth of skills PAs bring to a team, says Dr. Poole. "PAs are very well-educated individuals. Many have had some sort of prior experience, such as medic experience in the military, so their training is solid," she says. In her work, PAs have proven highly valuable members of the team. "They should be sought after and included as part of the allied professional team for anyone considering expanding their practice in that manner."
</p>
<p>
<em>Rita Colorito is a freelance journalist who specializes in writing about health care.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the March/April 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter. WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="https://wsma.org/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:26:25 AM | 3/4/2020 12:42:30 PM | 3/4/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| training_to_address_the_regions_unmet_health_care_needs | Training to Address the Region's Unmet Health Care Needs | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/March/training_to_address_the_regions_unmet_health_care_needs | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/News/Cover-WSMA_MarApril-2020-v6-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports cover" /></div>
<h5>March 4, 2020</h5>
<h2>Training to Address the Region's Unmet Health Care Needs</h2>
<p>
By Pat Curry
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
In 1968, 14 former medics or corpsmen enrolled in a new program jointly sponsored by the WSMA and the University of Washington School of Medicine and funded by the National Center for Health Services Research. The 18-month program, called the MEDEX Demonstration Project, would allow them to continue the training they had gained in the military and use it to begin careers in civilian health care as physician assistants.
</p>
<p>
The program, only the second of its kind in the nation, was created by Richard A. Smith, MD, to address a shortage of qualified medical professionals. By the time MEDEX Northwest celebrated the 50th anniversary of that first graduating class in 2019, the program had graduated more than 2,600 physician assistants.
</p>
<p>
Over the years, the program expanded beyond accepting former military medics—it now accepts applicants with health care experience, including nurses, EMTs, Alaska community health aides, medical assistants, and athletic trainers. The original class of 14 is now 140 students training in four locations in Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma, and Anchorage, with a fifth location in Hawaii in the works.
</p>
<p>
Central to the mission at MEDEX Northwest is a commitment to educating "experienced health personnel from diverse backgrounds to practice medicine with physician supervision."
</p>
<p>
"As one of the original programs in the country, our program was established on people with prior health care experience," says Terry Scott, PA-C, MPA, DFAAPA, program director of MEDEX Northwest. "We still think that matters. When you walk into medicine after just two years of study, you need some experience with the health care field."
</p>
<p>
A graduate of MEDEX, Scott trained and worked in both rural and urban communities in Washington, worked in HIV vaccine research, and provided primary care to HIV-positive patients. He joined the MEDEX faculty in 1996 and maintains a practice at the University of Washington Family Practice Residency in Seattle.
</p>
<p>
The PA program also has gotten longer; it is now a master's degree with 27 months of training and a capstone project. The first year consists of didactic training, followed by a four- month family practice preceptorship and then six one-month clerkships in behavioral medicine, emergency medicine, surgery, inpatient, and underserved populations; and one elective. During that time, the students also work on an in-depth, clinically relevant capstone project.
</p>
<p>
"There's been a maturing of the profession," Scott says. "The complexity of the profession requires the education be extensive and exhaustive."
</p>
<h3>Keeping the vision alive and moving forward</h3>
<p>
Senior Medical Director Tim Evans, MD, PhD, FACP, is one of the MEDEX faculty the students see in the classroom in their first year of training. Dr. Evans gives 250-300 hours of lectures a year; he says he has immense admiration for their commitment to medicine.
</p>
<p>
"Our students, year after year after year, are really terrific," Dr. Evans says. "They're smart, they're hardworking, they're here for a reason. ... They're making some very serious sacrifices. You have to honor that, and I do."
</p>
<p>
With the MEDEX program residing in UW's department of family medicine, the training PAs receive complements that of physicians in the same way PAs complement physicians in clinical practice.
</p>
<p>
"Medicine is a team sport," Scott says. "You need to teach everyone how to get the highest level from their training. We want all of us out there making a difference in the lives of our patients, delivering care to the public."
</p>
<p>
While much has changed over the last half century, Scott notes that one thing has stayed the same: the program remains committed to diversity and inclusion, equity and justice.
</p>
<p>
"We want to provide training and education to meet the nation's health care needs," he says. "That's from Dr. Richard Smith. He had an idea of what he wanted this program to be; those values have remained. It's in our DNA. We are the current caretakers of that vision."
</p>
<p>
The message Scott would share with WSMA members is that MEDEX is a well-established program and that PAs are not technicians.
</p>
<p>
"We are health care providers trained to deliver high-quality health care in collaboration with physicians," he says. "What doesn't change is a team- based approach to medicine. We are still here determined to deliver high-quality health to the region and the country."
</p>
<h3>A mission of rural service</h3>
<p>
Heritage University, Washington state's second PA training program, currently is training its fifth class of PAs. Program Director Linda Dale, PA-C, DHEd, has been a PA since 1996 and taught for 10 years at MEDEX.
</p>
<p>
The mission of Heritage University's program is to put its students in primary care in rural, underserved areas.
</p>
<p>
"We are in Toppenish," she says. "We're in the middle of the hop fields; we are a Hispanic-serving institution. I was born and raised in this area; it's always been medically underserved. Most Washington counties are. Even in King County and Spokane County, there are pockets that are underserved. Our mission is to increase access to health care for those populations."
</p>
<p>
"That's an intense need," says Medical Director Joseph DiMeo, DO. "I'm also a clinician in town. The deficits in patient access to care are acute."
</p>
<p>
The school has "done pretty well so far" in addressing that mission, Dale says. The national average for PAs working in rural areas is 12.5%; Heritage has 24% of its grads working in rural areas, she says. Nationally, 26.7% of PAs work in primary care; for Heritage grads, it's 46%.
</p>
<p>
The focus of Heritage University's training is primary care. It complements the training of physician students by following the medical model for training. On a weekly basis, students attend class with DO students at Pacific Northwest University.
</p>
<p>
"We are side-by-side with DO students doing case discussions and workshops where they'll do sutures, splinting, casting," she says. "It's an interprofessional education, not only with DO students but nursing, pharmD, and paramedic students, for some of our clinical case discussions."
</p>
<p>
Heritage teaches in systems modules, such as the cardiovascular system. A module covers anatomy and physiology, how to do an exam, what it looks like in a child, an adult, an elderly patient, chronic conditions and how that presents in the ER, Dale says.
</p>
<p>
"In that same model, we'll teach how to treat it, including pharmacology and lifestyle," she says. "When complete, we test on it. Once that's tested, we moved to the next system."
</p>
<p>
The biggest difference from MEDEX's curriculum comes in the clinical year, Dale says. Heritage places students in a clinical site for a full year, working there two days a week. For the rest of the week, they do their specialties—surgery, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, inpatient, emergency medicine, and mental health—switching about every six weeks. Sites are primarily in Washington, Idaho, Montana, and Alaska.
</p>
<p>
"The beauty of that is that when they learn something in their specialty, they'll bring it back to primary care," she says. "It gives them a great handle on it and takes the fear away from having to know everything as a primary care provider. I think that is why we have 46% of our students in primary care; they've been in it for a full year.
</p>
<p>
"This training is what a family practice physician used to do in the old days," she says. "Now with changes in their training, we're seeing more and more physicians go to specialties. We're trying to go back to the family medicine model. Sometimes, the old ways might be better."
</p>
<p>
That focus is being coupled with more and more simulation, Dr. DiMeo says. The result is that students get a greater experience of hands-on integration with medical decision-making "so they can handle more difficult things in a safe environment before they go into clinical practice."
</p>
<h3>Evidence of impact</h3>
<p>
Even with just four graduating classes under its belt, Heritage University already is seeing its efforts rewarded with increased access to health care in underserved areas.
</p>
<p>
"The impact on those patients' lives is difficult to measure, but relieving the pressure on the other clinicians in the area cuts down on their stress and ultimately keeps them practicing in those areas longer," she says.
</p>
<p>
To help address the workforce challenges physicians are facing, Heritage University works to get students ready to see patients as soon as they finish their clinical rotation, Dr. DiMeo says. "They're not a draw against the number of patients the [physician] has to see in a day."
</p>
<p>
"Over the course of their training and then when they go into clinical practice, their education needs to continue," he says. "They need to fit into the practice; there needs to be a comfort level between what the PA thinks they can handle and what the physician thinks they can handle, communicating on a daily basis about any complicated things. That's less and less over time. ... Even at times a physician will be challenged and call for a consult. That is the way medicine is practiced."
</p>
<p>
<em>Pat Curry is senior editor of WSMA Reports. </em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the March/April 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter. WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="https://wsma.org/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:27:24 AM | 3/4/2020 12:42:33 PM | 3/4/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| Behind_the_Cover | Behind the Cover | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/January/Behind_the_Cover | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/News/WSMAReports-Extras-Website-645x425.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports Extras logo" /></div>
<h5>January 17, 2020</h5>
<h2>Behind the Cover</h2>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>Kicking off the new year with our January/February edition of <em>WSMA Reports</em>, art director Erin Foster selected internationally renowned Spanish-Argentinian illustrator <a href="http://www.martinelfman.com/" target="_blank">Martín Elfman</a> as the issue's cover illustrator. </p>
<p>"What drew me to Martín's work is his keen sensibility for pinpointing a story's concept with striking minimalist elements," she says. "He also has a deft line quality and sense of color that I felt would make for a strong cover art. He definitely did not disappoint!"<br />
<br />
<a href="javascript://[Uploaded files/News and Publications/Publications/WSMA Reports Archive/WSMA_JanFeb 2020-PRINTERS FINAL.pdf]">View the cover illustration for <em>WSMA Reports</em>' January/February 2020 issue</a>.</p>
<p>
The cover story focuses on the federal and state actions that may impact the medical profession during the legislative sessions in 2020. From that broad-based topic, the article touched on many of the concerns currently plaguing physicians—administrative burdens caused by prior authorization, the threat to independent physician practices from the state’s business and occupation (B&amp;O) tax, and the need for reimbursement to catch up with the emerging technology of telemedicine. </p>
<p>
Here’s how Martín saw the challenge: “The story behind the cover is about the challenges lawmakers will face in the next legislative session. How to give a graphic shape to concepts as abstract as legality and health? After much thought, I suddenly realized that the dome of the Washington State Capitol building can easily be transformed into the bell of a stethoscope. This is my favorite moment of the creative process, the spark in which everything fits and an unexpected solution appears. From there, with that little finding in my pocket, it was just about adding a doctor at the other end of the stethoscope, listening carefully to measure the state of health of the legislative chamber."</p>
<p>
His concept was spot on from our perspective. All that was needed was to make the Capitol building look like our own state Capitol in Olympia, and to write a headline that tied it all together. And done! Check it out and let us know what you think.
</p>
<p><em>WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="https://wsma.org/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:38:07 AM | 1/17/2020 10:36:14 AM | 1/17/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| a_doctor_in_the_house | A Doctor in the House | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/January/a_doctor_in_the_house | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/News/WSMA_JanFeb-2020-PRINTERS-FINAL-Cover-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports January-February 2020 cover" /></div>
<h5>January 2, 2020</h5>
<h2>A Doctor in the House</h2>
<p>
By John Gallagher
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
It was just a year ago that Issaquah pediatrician Rep. Kim Schrier, MD, entered the U.S. House of Representatives representing Washington state's 8th Congressional District. She became not only one of 89 first-time members of the House, but also the only woman physician in Congress. "I had no idea really what to expect," Dr. Schrier says now, looking back. "I had no idea of what a day-to-day life of a member of Congress would be."
</p>
<p>
What she discovered was that the environment on Capitol Hill wasn't the snake pit that most people think exists in the current Congress.
</p>
<p>
"I was so pleasantly surprised to find good people who just want to do the best for their communities, who sacrifice their lives at home, their time, and their privacy," Dr. Schrier says. "They're very welcoming. It's an honor to be part of the freshmen class with so many people from different backgrounds, but all motivated to run for the same reasons."
</p>
<h3>A doctor's heart for health care</h3>
<p>
Dr. Schrier's reason for running was to advance health care policy. "I spent a lot of time on the campaign trail talking about having a woman doctor in Congress," she says. "A lot is happening in the health care arena, and we shouldn't leave these decisions up to people who haven't worked in, lived in, and been patients in this crazy system of ours."
</p>
<p>
Living up to her promise, Dr. Schrier began her first term by diving right in to health care policy and legislation and serves as co-chair of the New Democratic Coalition Health Care Task Force. As is befitting for a pediatrician, one of her key issues has been the Vaccines Awareness Campaign to Champion Immunization Nationally and Enhance Safety (VACCINES) Act, which she introduced. The bill would track places with high vaccine hesitancy, or decreasing vaccine rates, study why this is happening, and then target information to those places specifically tailored to the reason.
</p>
<p>
"If my VACCINES bill can help increase immune rates and push back against the narrative of the anti-vaxxers, I would feel great, even if that's the only thing I accomplished," she says.
</p>
<p>
Dr. Schrier has been heavily involved in other health care legislation, such as efforts to shore up the Affordable Care Act. She has also been active in efforts to expand Medicare to include vision coverage and to protect patients against surprise billing.
</p>
<p>
She heard stories of patients who checked their plans' provider directories to make sure that their physician would be in network, only to discover when they were hit with a huge bill that the directory was out of date. As a result, Dr. Schrier reached across the aisle to co-sponsor legislation with Republican and fellow physician Rep. Phil Roe that would mandate insurance companies update their provider directories in a timely manner.
</p>
<p>
Dr. Schrier is also a supporter of HR 3, The Lower Drug Costs Now Act, which would authorize the Secretary of Health and Human Services to negotiate prices for the 250 most expensive drugs covered by Medicare, with the cost savings passed on to the private market.
</p>
<p>
"I'm really excited about HR 3," she says. "I've heard over and over again, 'I don't understand why they pay less in Canada than we do.' That's essentially would this bill would do."
</p>
<p>
Dr. Schrier has also introduced a bill that would speed up development of a biosimilar version of insulin. But her perspective on the issue is as much as a patient than as a physician, since she has Type 1 diabetes.
</p>
<p>
"I just yesterday called to order another bottle of my own insulin, Humalog, and it was no longer on the dispensary," she says. "It would cost $300 for a bottle! It's kind of crazy to me that it costs so much and that formularies change like that for no apparent reason."
</p>
<h3>A trusted resource</h3>
<p>
While all these legislative initiatives are the logical outgrowth of her own experience, Dr. Schrier has also become a resource for other members of Congress.
</p>
<p>
"What I find is my colleagues come to me to run questions by me about surprise billing or women's health," she says. "I get questions about milk and the Dairy Council pressuring my colleagues to support sweet milk in schools."
</p>
<p>
That extends to medical advice.
</p>
<p>
"I still get to be the consultant for all my colleagues with children about their rashes, fevers, and sleeping through the night," she notes. Then there was the time when a member of Congress fainted and she offered medical assistance.
</p>
<p>
Dr. Schrier also brings her perspective as a pediatrician to issues that for many outside of medicine may seem unconnected to health care, such as immigration. The Trump administration's policy of separating children from their parents at the border is also a health crisis because it is creating adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), which studies have shown carry lifelong consequences.
</p>
<p>
"They've already been through all kinds of trauma in journey, then we take them away from parents, and it's adding ACEs upon ACEs and creating a generation with problems with their mental and physical health," she says. "This is no way to treat kids."
</p>
<p>
Whether any of Dr. Schrier's proposed legislation can make it to the president's desk in a polarized Congress is impossible to predict.
</p>
<p>
"I can always hope for cooperation," she says optimistically. "I think that's up to the president to rise above it. Then I think we can get a lot done."
</p>
<p>
Sometimes that polarization spills over into Dr. Schrier's congressional workday. A Republican colleague tried to introduce an amendment into a higher education bill that would prohibit universities with an associated medical center from getting federal funds unless they promised to provide medical care for any baby born alive.
</p>
<p>
"That's just a dog whistle for the crazy notion on the other side that doctors are killing babies," she says. "A woman doctor carries weight in that position. I would speak so authoritatively to it."
</p>
<p>
All these experiences and more have confirmed to Dr. Schrier that her decision to run for Congress was the right call.
</p>
<p>
"I worried that I might give up practice and not win, but I have to tell you that I have grown a ton as a person through this experience and I have not had a moment of regret," she says. "I can do a lot more good for kids from Washington than from the confines of my own doctor's office."
</p>
<p>
Besides, Dr. Schrier says, being in Congress isn't all that different from being a resident, with one big difference. "There's just a lot of running around, up and down stairs, hustling to get to somewhere where you're only going to be for 10 minutes, then hustling back to somewhere else," she says. "Except that I have to do it much less comfortable shoes."
</p>
<p>
<em>John Gallagher is a Washington state-based freelance writer who specializes in covering health care.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the January/February 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter. WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="https://wsma.org/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:37:07 AM | 12/30/2019 2:48:09 PM | 1/2/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| policy_prognosis_uncertain | Policy Prognosis: Uncertain | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/January/policy_prognosis_uncertain | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/News/WSMA_JanFeb-2020-PRINTERS-FINAL-Cover-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports January-February 2020 cover" /></div>
<h5>January 2, 2020</h5>
<h2>Policy Prognosis: Uncertain</h2>
<p>
By John Gallagher
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
At a national level, the number of challenges affecting physicians and their practices seems almost endless. Administrative burdens, financial pressures, and emerging technologies are all changing the profession. Whether it's congressional legislation on tax policy or state-level insurance regulations, physicians around the country are buffeted by constant changes. In response, legislators are being forced to play catch-up with a rapidly shifting landscape.
</p>
<p>
Washington state is no exception.
</p>
<p>
Last year's legislative session was exceptionally busy, with bills addressing a broad range of issues, including vaccination exemptions, opioid prescribing, a public option plan, and a prohibition on balance billing.
</p>
<p>
"Last year saw a slew of big-ticket items," says Sean Graham, WSMA's director of government affairs. "Lawmakers told us they wanted to let those policies sink in. Of course, they always say that—then the next session everyone has bills they're pushing."
</p>
<p>
Still, the upcoming legislative session offers an opportunity to tackle plenty of other pressing issues. Among them are the administrative burdens caused by prior authorization, the threat to independent physician practices from the state's business and occupation (B&amp;O) tax, and the need for reimbursement to catch up with the emerging technology of telemedicine.
</p>
<h3>The prior authorization nightmare</h3>
<p>
The exact shape of any legislation about the first two issues will be determined as the session gets underway. In terms of the breadth of its impact, prior authorization is the biggest concern.
</p>
<p>
Imagine a patient presenting at a practice at 4 in the afternoon with severe abdominal pains. "We can't order a CT scan to rule out appendicitis because it requires prior authorization," says Amber Pedersen, the administrator for Valley Obstetrics and Gynecology in Spokane Valley. Because prior authorization takes at least one to three days, Pedersen says the patient will be referred to the ED, where the costs to her and to the health care system are far higher.
</p>
<p>
"Prior authorization is an everyday nightmare for every single doctor in every single specialty," says Teresa Girolami, MD, president of the King County Medical Society. "Prior authorization gets in the way of good medical care."
</p>
<p>
Prior authorization is also a major source of physician burnout. The American Medical Association estimates that physician practices complete an average of 31 prior authorizations a week per physician, consuming roughly 14.9 hours—almost two full business days—of physician and staff time. A bill is pending in Congress to standardize prior authorization across Medicare Advantage plans.
</p>
<p>
The AMA released its 2018 Prior Authorization Physician Survey results last year, surveying 1,000 practicing physicians about the impact of prior authorization on their work. More than 90% of the physicians reported care delays associated with prior authorization, and almost as many said that the burdens of prior authorization have increased over the past five years. Most disturbing was the fact that 28% of the physicians reported that prior authorization had led to a serious adverse event for a patient in their care.
</p>
<p>
Physicians and practice administrators in Washington echo the national survey results. Dr. Girolami recalls a patient who came to her office on a Friday. Dr. Girolami ordered a CT scan, which led to a biopsy and a diagnosis of metastatic colon cancer. By Wednesday, the patient was meeting with an oncologist.
</p>
<p>
"Then someone had the nerve to call me about prior authorization," Dr. Girolami says. After telling the insurer that she had quickly identified a lifethreatening condition, Girolami was able to get the plan to back down.
</p>
<p>
Then, there's the cumbersome administrative burden imposed by prior authorization. Pedersen, who works at a practice with nine providers, says that one staffer in the office deals with an average of five to seven prior authorizations each day.
</p>
<p>
"I can grasp the concept, but it's gone too far," she says. "We spend anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour for one prior authorization for certain carriers. What the staff complain about most is that when you call the carrier for assistance, on average you get transferred three times. Sometimes, it takes 10 minutes just to get to the right person to answer a question or to get the correct form that needs to be filled out. Some carriers have different forms depending on the test or medication."
</p>
<p>
For an obstetrics practice, genetic screening is now the standard of care, but Pedersen says that most screenings still require prior authorization. New medications almost invariably require prior authorizations, but plans also request prior authorizations for even common treatments.
</p>
<p>
"When I first started in health care, I don't remember getting prior authorizations except for chemo meds," Pedersen says. "Now I'm getting them for everyday therapy."
</p>
<h3>B&amp;O tax burden unfairly targets independent practices </h3>
<p>
While all practices struggle with the costs that prior authorization imposes on them, independent practices are now struggling with an additional burden due to legislation passed last year. The state legislature increased the B&amp;O tax on independent practices by 20%, threatening the viability of many of those practices, particularly in already underserved rural areas where they are common. Getting the legislature to roll back the increase, which funds college financial aid for students from families earning below the state median income, will be a challenge.
</p>
<p>
While other professions were included in the tax increase, they can make their customers pay for it. "Medicine should have been excluded from this increase because we are not like other forms of business getting taxed," says Chelsea Unruh, MD, a physician at Yelm Family Medicine and president of the Thurston-Mason County Medical Society. "We don't get to control our prices and we don't get to say what we charge."
</p>
<p>
Dr. Unruh says managing a private practice is difficult enough, given the tight margins. "I have to make sure I pay staff and keep the lights on, and pay my salary, too, so I can pay my loans back," they say.
</p>
<p>
The B&amp;O tax has had a direct impact on the care the practice is able to provide, leading to care being restricted or even ended for poorer patients. "I have to limit how many Medicaid people I can see because of the overhead of being in a private practice," they say. "The B&amp;O tax added even more pressure onto that already-tight overhead and is making it more difficult to be able to serve the vulnerable population. It's one of the most frustrating parts of being in medicine."
</p>
<p>
As an internist in a solo practice, Dr. Girolami experiences similar pressures. "If you take charity care, Medicaid, or Apple Health, you're already running in the hole," she says. "You have to limit the number of people you see, which gives them way less choice. It's painful."
</p>
<p>
Dr. Girolami also says that the additional expense leads to diverting investments that could improve office efficiency. "That money may have been earmarked for a texting service or software," she says. "Now you have to take a hard look at it." As a result, she says, the tax "is punitive to smaller groups."
</p>
<p>
The fallout may not be limited to current investments. Dr. Unruh says that the tax will make it harder to recruit physicians to rural practices, worsening an already bad problem.
</p>
<p>
"Folks coming out of medical school are coming out with more loans than we've ever seen in the past and not as much incentive to go into private practice," they say. "We're limiting our ability to be competitive for a new workforce."
</p>
<h3>The technology reimbursement gap</h3>
<p>
Technology—specifically telemedicinewill also be on the agenda for the next legislative session. By allowing for long-distance clinician-patient contact, telemedicine has the potential to provide medical care to those who would otherwise have to travel for it or not receive it at all.
</p>
<p>
However, while Washington insurers must provide coverage, telemedicine may be reimbursed at a lower rate than an in-person visit, which disincentivizes use of the technology. About 10 states, including California and Florida, have passed legislation to correct this disparity, but a bill to do so in Washington, SB 5385, failed to pass last year. The bill will automatically be reintroduced in the new session. Sen. Randi Becker, sponsor of the legislation, worked in the medical field for 24 years, starting as a practice receptionist and ending as an administrator.
</p>
<p>
"The intent of the legislation is to acknowledge the value of treating patients in a location that works for them," she says. "We want people to get the care they need at the time they need without having to travel." She points out that the need is especially keen in rural areas of the state where specialists are in short supply.
</p>
<p>
Becker notes that advances in health care technology often lag behind policy. (As an administrator, she led her clinic in developing the first internet billing system to transmit a claim to Medicare.) "I have always believed in technology in the health care arena," she says. "As a nation, we have embraced technology. But why do we not embrace it as easily in health care? We can't get in the way of technology."
</p>
<p>
By eliminating the payment disparity, Becker believes that telemedicine will be able to develop its potential more readily. She's hopeful about the bill's chances this time around. "Time was a factor last time," she says. "There's optimism about this going through this year."
</p>
<p>
<em>John Gallagher is a freelance journalist specializing in covering health care.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the January/February 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter. WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="https://wsma.org/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:39:10 AM | 12/30/2019 2:42:59 PM | 1/2/2020 12:00:00 AM |
| practice_health_in_jeopardy | Practice Health in Jeopardy | WSMA_Reports | Shared_Content/News/Latest_News/2020/January/practice_health_in_jeopardy | <div class="col-md-12">
<div class="col-md-5 pull-right" style="text-align: center;"><img src="/images/News/WSMA_JanFeb-2020-PRINTERS-FINAL-Cover-645x425px.jpg" class="pull-right" alt="WSMA Reports January-February 2020 cover" /></div>
<h5>January 2, 2020</h5>
<h2>Practice Health in Jeopardy</h2>
<p>
By Teresa M. Girolami, MD
</p>
<p><em>Members only; sign-in required.</em></p>
<p>
<em>Dear Valued Customer: Due to an increase in operating costs, we're raising prices on our coffee beverages - please pardon the inconvenience.</em>
</p>
<p>
When I read that note at my favorite coffee shop, I didn't hesitate to accept the price increase. As the owner of small private practice in Redmond, I empathize with decisions that must be made with increasing expenses.
</p>
<p>
It also got me thinking again, as I often do, of the ways in which running a private practice or independent clinic differs from other small businesses—and how our business model is increasingly under threat in Washington state.
</p>
<p>
Last year, state lawmakers passed a 20% increase in the business and occupation (B&amp;O) tax on small service businesses, including independent physician practices like mine. I doubt the Legislature realized the impact this tax increase has on independent practices and clinics—where roughly a third or more of our state's physicians practice—and the patients they serve.
</p>
<p>
How are physician businesses unlike other small businesses? We get paid mainly by insurance companies, not by our primary customers. We have limited negotiation power and we get paid less each year. Unlike a coffee shop, when our expenses go up, we have no way to recover the resulting loss. We cannot—and don't want to—pass this expense on to our patients.
</p>
<p>
And yet it's patients—largely our most vulnerable ones—who bear the brunt of this legislative decision. Unfairly targeting independent physician businesses with tax increases forces them to make hard decisions to keep their doors open in a highly competitive environment. Patients covered by public programs that are low payers, like Medicare and Medicaid (which covers many of our state's children), are being turned away.
</p>
<p>
In a worst-case scenario, a practice will close, with many more patients losing access to their primary physicians. Just last year, three rural practices closed, citing increasing business expenses.
</p>
<p>
The health of our state's independent practices should concern all physicians. Patients who can't access preventive care often end up in urgent care clinics and emergency rooms. This adds strain to already over-burdened emergency centers and drives up everyone's cost of care. In other instances, patients are absorbed by employed physicians with panels already stretched thin, leading to more burnout.
</p>
<p>
Increasing the B&amp;O tax impacts businesses like mine in too many crucial ways to cover here, but each is essential to maintaining the health of independent practices and the balance of our health ecosystem.
</p>
<p>
On behalf of King County Medical Society, I sponsored a resolution passed unanimously by the WSMA House of Delegates that directs the WSMA to advocate to amend state law to exempt all physicians from the B&amp;O tax increase to protect the vital health interests of our communities. I urge all WSMA members, and all Washington state physicians, to oppose this unfair tax increase that will disproportionately harm independent practices and clinics.
</p>
<p>
I trust my local coffee shop will weather its increased expenses. But I am deeply concerned about thousands of small businesses like mine. Our health, and the health of Washington's medical community, is in jeopardy. Those consequences are far more serious than the loss of a morning cup of coffee.
</p>
<p>
<em>Teresa M. Girolami, MD, is the president of King County Medical Society and owner of BelRed Internal Medicine, PLLC.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>This article was featured in the January/February 2020 issue of WSMA Reports, WSMA's print newsletter. WSMA Reports is a benefit of membership. Non-members may <a href="https://wsma.org/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/WSMA/News_Publications/Publications/Publications.aspx?hkey=8f14076c-10b8-48ab-9595-8c256836e393">purchase a subscription</a>.</em>
</p>
</div> | 7/7/2020 10:40:12 AM | 12/30/2019 2:48:05 PM | 1/2/2020 12:00:00 AM |