Healthcare Reform and the American Academy of Facial Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery
September 30, 2009
Our Board of Directors of the American Academy of Facial Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery (AAFPRS) has come out strongly against the proposed healthcare legislation, simply because it does nothing to guarantee physician income, the sanctity of the patient-physician relationship, or malpractice tort reform. (The following comments are mine, and not the Board’s.) These are critical issues that, because they are both difficult to pass and unpopular among the largely lawyer-filled Congress, have been dismissed as not includable. President Obama has shown remarkable stupidity in his comments relating to greedy surgeons who would jeopardize a child with tonsillectomy to gild their pockets. It reveals that underneath his great rhetoric lies extremely liberal core values that would rather see large government programs govern doctors’ rights to practice as we, as a profession, sees fit. His misguided notion that he can do all this without increasing taxes or our deficit is simply fanciful based on no version of reality. Cost controls are inevitable, but every time the current government programs have controlled costs it has been by slashing doctor reimbursements and invoking restrictive regulations that make it difficult even in good times for doctors to make ends meet. Further cost controls are inevitable, even as no one knows how our healthcare system can suddenly expand to accommodate millions of new patients.
President Obama has claimed that he has the doctors behind him because a misguided AMA continues to endorse the current legislation. To their credit, the American College of Surgeons initially endorsed the legislation, but has backed off as the weaknesses have become clearer. The AAFPRS has joined a coalition of surgical specialties and state medical societies opposing the legislation. I personally plan on dropping my expensive AMA membership since I clearly feel betrayed by their continued endorsement of this poorly conceived plan that will rob us of the ability to practice medicine as we see fit and interfere with our patient relationships.
