AMA specialists promote repeal of nondiscrimination toward chiropractors, other integrative practitioners

June 11, 2010 — The ink was hardly dry on the landmark Non-Discrimination in Health Care provision (Section 2706) of the Obama-Pelosi healthcare overhaul, the Patient Protection and Healthcare Affordability Act, and MD specialists are pushing its repeal.

Anesthesiologists and ophthalmologists have asked the AMA to initiate a lobbying campaign at the executive, Congressional and grassroots levels so the Section 2706 of the 2010 law, scheduled to come into effect in 2014, never does.

The request is framed as part of the AMA’s ongoing Scope of Practice Partnership against other professions. Section 2706 is healthcare reform’s most significant inclusiveness measure for DCs, NDs, LAcs, massage therapists and licensed midwives.

Section 2706, if not repealed, could open consumer choice to these practitioners to tens of millions of U.S. residents. In the name of patient protection, the two AMA specialty societies are acting against their direct competitors, nurse anesthetists and optometrists, but taking out integrative practitioners with them.

A look at the language in the proposed resolution as it will go to the AMA House of Delegates in June 2010 is available here.

Source: Integrative Practitioner, www.integrativepractitioner.com