Chiropractic Summit unanimously supports Medicare reform, elects new chairman at spring meeting

June 24, 2016—The Chiropractic Summit, an umbrella leadership group of prominent chiropractic organizations, met on April 28th in Phoenix, AZ. and approved, by unanimous motion, the following historic statement of agreement:

Unanimous Support for Medicare Reform

The Chiropractic Summit Partners unanimously supports the initiative to remove discrimination against chiropractic patients in Medicare and garner public support for such an effort.

This effort will require a profession-wide grassroots initiative the likes we have never seen before in order to garner public support from our patient population, friends, and families. The Chiropractic Summit fully understands that the time has come to end the discrimination that our profession has faced for far too long.

“We as a profession have unanimously achieved a milestone with this motion telling our brothers and sisters in chiropractic that we the leaders of our great profession have agreed to stop the discrimination against the public we serve,” said Lewis J. Bazakos, Summit chair, MS, DC. “That being said, we will need everyone in this profession to rise to the task at hand when called upon to support the grassroots initiatives of our member organizations.”

Please join with the Chiropractic Summit in this historic effort to answer the call to action when asked. Our patients’ rights to receive the care they deserve depends upon each and every one of us.

Summit Partners Elect New Chairman

The Summit Partners unanimously elected Norman Ouzts, DC to serve as the next chairman. Ouzts, who graduated from Life University & College of Chiropractic in Atlanta, Georgia, previously served as the president of the NBCE.

Ouzts has served most of his chiropractic career as an elected official, most notably as the District 5 Director and past-president of the National Board of Chiropractic Examiners (NBCE); former director of District 5 for the Federation of Chiropractic Licensing Boards (FCLB); former president of the South Carolina Board of Chiropractic Examiners and former president of the South Carolina Chiropractic Association. During his leadership tenure at these organizations, Ouzts has received many awards of distinction from these and other national organizations for his dedication, loyalty and commitment to the chiropractic profession. Ouzts term commences at the close of business at the fall Summit meeting on November 10, 2016.

Arizona Health Policy Division Director Addresses Summit Partners on Opioid Addiction Crisis

Will Humble, MPH, the division director for health policy and evaluation at the Center for Population Science & Discovery at the University of Arizona’s Health Sciences Center and former head of the Department of Health for the state of Arizona, joined the Summit Partners for a special presentation on ‘Opioid Addiction in America.’

Humble, widely-known for his vast knowledge on the issue of opioid addiction in this country and its association to chronic pain, discussed the 1996 American Pain Society Presidents’ declaration that “pain” is the 5th vital sign, the progression of new standards developed to treat pain as a vital sign, and the downstream effect this declaration caused with prescription drugs. Humble discussed the need for Federal prevention strategies for the states and Arizona’s efforts to review current initiatives and resources to ensure public health methodology is sound. Humble’s summary comments concerning the need to educate the public that ‘pain is part of the natural healing process’ is in-line with the Summit Partners initiative to explore ways to increase the awareness of chiropractic as a drug-free alternative.

Source: Chiropractic Summit