Government relations, Jay Witter, VP

Journal of the American Chiropractic Association, Nov 2002

During the past year, the ACA has been extremely active on Capitol Hill, advocating for pro-chiropractic initiatives. These issues ranged from increasing access to chiropractic care in the DoD and VA health care systems, empowering doctors in managed care plans, reforming Medicare, and expanding students' access to loan reimbursement programs. As a result of the strong support for the chiropractic profession on Capitol Hill, ACA has had a number of important legislative victories. Building on a successful National Chiropractic Legislative Conference (NCLC), the ACA is now in the midst of a major legislative campaign on Capitol Hill. The issues that ACA is working on include ensuring the proper implementation of the new chiropractic benefit in the VA health care system, the inclusion of the chiropractic profession in the National Health Service Corps, and the expansion of the chiropractic benefit in the Medicare program.

The following are some recent legislative and regulatory activities:

* The ACA successfully fought for the passage of comprehensive legislation (H.R 3447) that will provide veterans access to chiropractic care. The president signed this legislation into law on January 23, 2002. This legislation, for the first time, creates a permanent chiropractic benefit in the VA health care system, sets a broad scope of practice, authorizes the hiring of doctors of chiropractic in the VA, and establishes a chiropractic oversight committee that will participate in the development and implementation of the new benefit. This victory was not easy by any means. We had to overcome resistance from the VA, the White House, and the Senate VA Committee, as well as defend against attacks from medical groups. Because of the tremendous support of the ACA and the chiropractic profession on Capitol Hill, we were successful and our nation's veterans will have access to the chiropractic care they sorely need.

Now that the legislation has passed into law, the ACA will concentrate on the proper development and implementation of the new chiropractic benefit. The ACA will continue to work with the VA and Congress to ensure that all eligible veterans have access to a broad range of chiropractic services.

* To ease the large debt of chiropractic students and recent graduates, the ACA and ACC are fighting to increase access to student loan repayment programs. As a result, the Senate HELP Committee moved to include doctors of chiropractic for the first time ever in the National Health Service Corps' (NHSC) loan reimbursement program. On April 8, 2002, the Senate passed this legislation. The ACA is now working with key members of Congress to ensure that the House of Representatives accepts the Senate chiropractic provision. Should this legislation be signed into law, doctors of chiropractic would be eligible under certain circumstances to receive loan reimbursement through NHSC. Involvement in NHSC could potentially result in doctors of chiropractic gaining a federal designation as primary care providers.

* The ACA worked with Congressman Wes Watkins to introduce H.R. 902, which would reimburse DCs for all Medicare services within their states' scope of practice. H.R. 902 has strong bipartisan support in the House of Representatives. The bill already has 82 cosponsors. The ACA is working to incorporate a chiropractic provision based on H.R. 902 in the Medicare reform bill being considered in the House and Senate.

* The ACA was responsible for passage of legislation that created a permanent chiropractic benefit for all activeduty military personnel, set a minimum floor for scope of practice, and fully engaged doctors of chiropractic on the DoD Oversight Advisory Committee (OAC) in development and implementation of the new benefit. President Clinton signed this legislation (P.L. 106-398) into law October 30, 2000. The ACA continues to work to ensure this new benefit is implemented properly and is seeking additional appropriation funds to speed up the integration of chiropractic care in the DoD health care system

* The ACA fought successfully to get a doctor of chiropractic on the staff of the U.S. Congress Office of the Attending Physician. For the first time, members of Congress receive chiropractic adjustments on the Capitol premises. Because of the popularity of chiropractic among members of Congress, Dr. William Morgan's time at the Capitol has increased.

* The ACAs federal political action committee has a very strong political presence in Washington, D.C. During the last four election cycles (eight years), the ACA has contributed almost $2.5 million to pro-chiropractic candidates! In the 1999-2000 cycle, the ACA-PAC contributed over $400,000 to congressional candidates. In the November 2000 elections, 88 percent of candidates supported by the ACA-PAC won their races. The only other national chiropractic PAC of significance contributed only $20,000. The ACA-PAC fundraising continues to be strong. So far this cycle, the ACA-PAC has raised over $600,000 in contributions.