President's Message

Andrew R. Waxler, MD, FACC
february 2019

Dear PaACC Members:

Annually, ACC national leadership asks each chapter to put together a “State of the State” report highlighting our previous year. We thought that we would share some of what we accomplished together in 2019. It has indeed been a busy and productive year…read on!

Your PaACC:

• Significantly contributed to the effort to pass the High School CPR bill into law; this law now requires all state high school students to learn the basics of CPR prior to graduation
• Collaborated to pass Tobacco 21 into law; this raises the minimum age to buy tobacco products up to 21 and also institutes a minimum age of 21 for the purchase of vaping/E-cigarettes
• Successfully convinced HIGHMARK to reverse its proposed policy that would have required cardiologists to obtain prior authorization for transthoracic echocardiograms
• Rallied support and participated in the effort to successfully reverse the proposed dramatic Medicare cuts to cardiac PET reimbursement
• Crowned a champion team at our state-wide FIT Jeopardy competition that will go on to nationals at ACC.20 in Chicago
• Negotiated with Radiology and other stakeholders in an ongoing effort to exempt cardiac techs who work around x-rays (i.e., cath, EP) from a new bill that would potentially require them to fall under the control of Radiology
• Held another successful “She Looks Like a Cardiologist” event in Pittsburgh introducing and inspiring high school girls to consider cardiology as a career
• Discussed radiation safety particularly as it pertains to young women cardiologists at our WIC event 
• Sadly, we said goodbye to our long-term chapter executive Maria Elias who retired after 19 wonderful years; after a thorough search process, we were fortunate to hire Jennifer Ray Beckman as our new chapter executive. Jennifer has worked for the ACC for almost 20 years both at the national level as well as managing several other states 

• Negotiating and advocating to amend the flawed Act 112; this new bill, HB 2103, introduced by Rep Barry Jozwiak, is currently in the House Health Committee.
• Continuing to champion the need for significant Prior Authorization reform which would help both patients and physicians/providers through companion bills, HB 1194 introduced by Rep Steve Mentzer and SB920 introduced by Senator Kristin Phillips-Hill
• Working to continue to resolve the efforts by the State Supreme Court to bring back "Venue Shifting." This would allow plaintiff attorneys to move virtually any alleged malpractice case from anywhere in Pennsylvania into the plaintiff-friendly Philadelphia court system. We are trying to keep the current system which mandates that alleged malpractice is adjudicated in the county in which it allegedly occurred.
• Collaborating on many meetings throughout the state including possibly partnering with the Delaware Valley Society of Thoracic Surgery (DVSTS)

Andy

Humans of Cardiology is an opportunity for PaACC members to share motivating stories about their personal and professional lives and was inspired by the wildly popular Humans of New York series. Submit your story and view past posts here.