If you are in research, private practice, physical therapy, or a fellow right out of training, we are all members of the same team with the same goal: ensuring the long-term viability of our subspecialty and providing arthritis and rheumatic disease patients with top-quality, high-value care. It is time for us to unite and ensure that every member of Congress knows that rheumatologists are engaged and paying attention to the policies being debated. If you want to change the way cognitive specialists are reimbursed, you have to be involved. If you want to ensure that the National Institutes of Health is appropriately funded so we can continue to develop new treatments and cures, you have to talk to your lawmakers. If you want to ensure the viability of the rheumatology subspecialty, we all have to get in the game.
If we are not talking to members of Congress about these issues, who is? The reality is that the insurance companies, trial attorneys, and our colleagues in the procedural specialties aren’t taking a time out. We must continue to educate lawmakers on the value of rheumatology, the improved outcomes we provide for our patients, and the benefits of innovative treatments that come from biomedical research. As Vince Lombardi said, “People who work together will win, whether it be against complex football defenses, or the problems of modern society.” It is up to each one of us to make the effort to pick up the phone, send an e-mail, attend a meeting or town hall, participate in RheumPAC, or come to Washington, D.C., to impact the policies that affect our patients and our subspecialty. We owe it to our profession and, most importantly, to our patients. The time for sitting on the sidelines is over.
Dr. O’Dell is director of the Internal Medicine Residency Program and division chief of rheumatology at the University of Nebraska, Omaha and the Omaha VA medical centers. Contact him via email at [email protected].
