During his presidential address at the AMA House of Delegates meeting, Gerald E. Harmon, MD, outlined five actions that he said policymakers must take to better support physicians, Healio reports.
These actions are part of the AMA’s Recovery Plan for Physicians, an “ambitious” but “doable” roadmap that will help physicians move forward after 2 years of sacrifices during the COVID-19 pandemic, Harmon said.
The five actions that AMA is advocating for are to:
- expand telehealth;
- reform the Medicare payment system;
- stop the “unsafe scope of practice expansions;”
- fix prior authorization; and
- increase efforts to reduce physician burnout, retain the workforce and address stigma surrounding mental health.
During the pandemic, 90% of physicians opted to deliver care through telehealth, about half of whom had never used it before, Harmon said. CMS introduced flexibilities so that physicians could be reimbursed the same amount when delivering care through telehealth, including audio-only visits, as they would for in-person services, he added.
To ensure these changes continue after the public health emergency is over, Harmon said that the AMA is “fighting to update our laws and regulations.” Read more.
