AACE leads advocacy effort to pass improved diabetes care legislation
TheAmerican Association of Clinical Endocrinologistsis leading more than 40 national organizations that represent physicians, health professionals, patients, communities and the medical industry to support the National Diabetes Clinical Care Commission Act, according to a news release from the organization.
With an aim to improve care for people withdiabetes, prediabetes and related illnesses, the legislation calls for the creation of a commission comprising the foremost diabetes experts in the U.S., including endocrinologists and related clinical care specialists, patient advocates and federal agency representatives.
While well-intentioned, many of the nations health care regulatory activities on this front are inconsistent, ineffective or overlapping, so its incumbent upon on Congress to take action immediately to pass this legislation that calls for better leveraging our governments investments to reverse this dire situation and improve clinical care,R.Mack Harrell, MD, FACP, FACE, ECNU,president of the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists (AACE), said in the release.
R. Mack Harrell
In addition to identifying duplication and critical gaps in federal diabetes initiatives, the commission would make recommendations to improve the diabetes care implementation and coordination, according to the release.
A delegation of AACE leaders plans to visit with Congress members this week to advocate for the act and other high-priority legislative initiatives.
The legislation, H.R.1192, is cosponsored in the U.S. House of Representatives by Rep. Pete Olson (R-22-TX) and Rep. Dave Loebsack (D-2-IA) and in the U.S. Senate by Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) and Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH).
Among the other organizations involved in the effort are The Endocrine Society, the American Diabetes Association, the Diabetes Hands Foundation, the diatribe Foundation and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
Diabetes and its devastating complications are exacting a terrible physical and financial toll on our countrys population, and it has become an unmanageable situation, Harrell said.
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