General Session III: Health Policy 2023

1.75 CME / 1.75 CMD Management

The Society’s Top Policy Issues of 2023
Speakers: Victoria L. Walker, MD, CMD, FAAFP; Timothy Holahan, DO, CMD; Alex Bardakh, MPP; Christian Bergman, MD, CMD; Dallas L. Nelson, MD, CMD; Thomas Lehner, MD, FAAFP, CMD

Updates on the top Society activity on policy issues including the following: legislative advocacy, communications with government agencies, updates on the health care reform implementation efforts and on proposed changes to PALTC facilities requirements for participation.

Learning Objectives:

At the completion of this session, learners will be able to:

List the Society's top policy issues in 2023
Discuss the Society's advocacy on legislative initiatives, health care reform and payment policy

Moving Forward: A Conversation on Nursing Home Reform
Speakers: Alice Bonner, PhD, RN, FAAN; Cynthia Morton, MPA; Christopher Laxton, CAE; Elizabeth White, APRN, PhD; Mike Wasserman, MD, CMD; Isaac O. Longobardi, BA

Join leaders of the Moving Forward Coalition to discuss the Coalition’s efforts to improve nursing home quality through tactical efforts in policy and practice. Moving Forward is a diverse and growing group – with over 800 individuals and supporting organizations from across the country. The Coalition will develop, test, and promote action plans to advance priority 2022 NASEM report recommendations on nursing home quality. Panelists will discuss ownership data transparency, health information technology, workforce issues, as well as efforts to build a network of state-based teams.

Learning Objectives:

At the completion of this session, learners will be able to:

Identify how at least one challenge in nursing home quality can be addressed in a specific and time-bound way
Access language and resources to talk about nursing home quality improvement in their own organizations and communities
Better understand the power that medical directors have in influencing national and local quality improvement efforts

Presenters:

Michael Wasserman, MD, CMD, is a graduate of the University of Texas, Medical Branch. He completed an Internal Medicine residency at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and a Geriatric Medicine Fellowship at UCLA. Dr. Wasserman has been a tireless advocate for vulnerable older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic, with multiple peer reviewed publications and television appearances. He is involved with the National Advisory Committee on Seniora and Disasters and previously served as a member of the National Academy of Science’s “A Framework for Equitable Allocation of Vaccine for the Novel Coronavirus” Committee. He is Editor-in-Chief of Springer’s upcoming textbook, Geriatric Medicine: A Person Centered Evidence Based Approach. He previously served as CEO overseeing the largest nursing home chain in California. Prior to that, he was the Executive Director, Care Continuum, for the CMS contracted Quality Improvement Organization for California. In 2001, he co-founded Senior Care of Colorado, which became the largest privately owned primary care geriatrics practice in the country, before selling it in 2010. In the 1990’s he was President and Chief Medical Officer for GeriMed of America, a Geriatric Medical Management Company, and developed GeriMed’s Clinical Glidepaths in conjunction with Drs. Flaherty and Morley of St. Louis University’s School of Medicine Geriatric Division. In 1989, in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, Doctor Wasserman published "Fever, White Blood Cells and Differential Count in Diagnosing Bacterial Infection in the Elderly,” the findings of which are now part of the McGeer Criteria, used widely in nursing homes to evaluate residents for infections.

Thomas Lehner, MD, FAAFP, CMD, is a Family Physician from Wadsworth Ohio. He is also the Medical Director for four LTC Facilities and Gentiva Hospice in NEO. Mr. Lehner has been a member of AMDA and a CMD since 1997. His hobbies are flying, classic cars and motorsports.

Isaac Longobardi, BA, is a recent graduate of Harvard College. He currently serves as Associate Director of the Moving Forward Nursing Home Quality Coalition. Previously, he worked as Program Coordinator for the Hebrew SeniorLife Volunteer, Youth, and Community Engagement Department, while piloting multigenerational living at Center Communities of Brookline, one of Hebrew SeniorLife’s independent living communities.

Alex Bardakh, MPP, is the Director of Public Policy and Advocacy for AMDA – The Society. Mr. Bardakh works for the Society’s extensive Public Policy agenda through Advocacy in Congress and numerous Federal Agencies. A graduate from the University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) in Political Science/Psychology and Master’s Degree in Public and Legal Policy, Mr. Bardakh has extensive experience in health policy with a specific focus on areas such as payment models and quality of care initiatives. He has been a recognized national speaker on healthcare policy and has spoken at national conferences throughout the country.

Cynthia Morton, MPA, joined NASL as the Executive Vice President in September of 2010 and has led the organization to advocate for high quality care for the patients NASL members serve through working to advance legislative and regulatory policy. Prior to joining NASL, Ms. Morton served as the Vice President for Political Affairs for the American Health Care Association/National Center for Assisted Living. For more than a decade with AHCA/NCAL, she represented the long term care profession before Congress, the Washington health care community, and the media. She also was responsible for lobbying, political strategy and building relationships with Members of Congress and developed policy and positions primarily on Medicaid and related long term care issues such as provider tax, intergovernmental transfers, dual eligibles, ICF/MR and developmental disability issues, Medicaid block grants, waivers and long term care financing reform. She graduated from James Madison University with a Bachelor of Science in political science and holds a Master of Public Administration degree from Virginia Commonwealth University.

Alice Bonner, PhD, RN, FAAN, has been a nurse practitioner for over 30 years. She is currently Senior Advisor for Aging at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) and Chair of Moving Forward: Nursing Home Quality Coalition. From 2015-2019, Dr. Bonner served as Secretary of the Executive Office of Elder Affairs for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. From 2011 to 2013, Dr. Bonner served as Director of the Division of Nursing Homes in the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) in Baltimore, MD.

Timothy Holahan, DO, CMD, is an Assistant Professor at University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry. He is Board Certified in Internal Medicine, Geriatric Medicine and Palliative Care Medicine. He serves as Medical Director of multiple skilled nursing facilities in the Rochester, NY area and serves as Medical Director of a SNF long term ventilator unit. He is currently the Chair of the AMDA Ethics Committee and Vice Chair of the AMDA Public Policy Committee. His passion is to deliver high quality geriatric care in nursing homes and care for complex patients in the SNF setting.

Elizabeth White, APRN, PhD, is an Assistant Professor of Health Services, Policy, and Practice at the Brown University School of Public Health. Her research agenda broadly focuses on understanding how frail medically-complex older adults receive healthcare services, and how factors affecting the nursing and primary care workforces impact quality outcomes in long-term care. She is a co-investigator on currently funded projects to evaluate the impact of Medicare’s new Patient Driven Payment Model on nursing home care quality, staffing, and costs; to explore the role of advanced practice clinicians in end-of-life care for individuals with dementia; and to examine various aspects of COVID-19 management, treatment, and outcomes in nursing homes. Dr. White completed an AHRQ T32 postdoctoral fellowship at Brown in the Center for Gerontology and Healthcare Research, and an NINR T32 predoctoral fellowship in the Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing. In addition to her research, Dr. White is a board-certified adult geriatric primary care nurse practitioner with extensive clinical experience in long-term care, primary care, and acute care. She currently practices as a nurse practitioner at the PACE Organization of Rhode Island.

Christopher Laxton, CAE, is a career association professional with 35 years of experience in nonprofit leadership, governance and operations. Laxton was appointed Executive Director of AMDA – The Society for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine in February, 2013. In addition to his role at AMDA, Mr. Laxton serves as Chair of the Board of Directors of the Advancing Excellence in Long-Term Care Coalition, and as a Board member of the Center for Excellence in Assisted Living. From 2008 until the present, Mr. Laxton has served as a National Examiner on the Board of Examiners for the prestigious Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, the nation’s highest award for organizational performance excellence. He was designated a Master Examiner, and appointed to the Judges’ Panel for the Baldrige Award, earlier this year.

Dallas Nelson, MD, CMD, is an Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of the Rochester in the Division Geriatrics and aging. She is medical director of the UR Medicine Geriatrics Group, a group that serves about 3000 patients across the spectrum of long term care in the Rochester Metro Area. She also serves as the medical director of a nursing facilitiy and an assisted living facility. Dr. Nelson is the primary care physician for residents in across the long term care continuum. Dr. Nelson’s main interest are improving health care delivery to the frail older adult and educating practicing providers in geriatric medicine.

Victoria Walker, MD, CMD, FAAFP, is the Medical and Clinical Officer for the Avera eCARE Senior Care telemedicine program. She provides support and direction to an interdisciplinary team that supports nursing home staff and residents of post acute, long term care and assisted living in 24 states. Dr. Walker is also a Clinical professor of Family Medicine at the University of South Dakota Sanford School of Medicine. She currently serves on the AMDA Board of Directors, the Clinical Issues Subcommittee of the Public Policy Committee, the Telemedicine Workgroup and the Education workgroup for the North Central Society of PALTC.

Christian Bergman, MD, CMD, is board-certified in Internal Medicine and Geriatric Medicine. He attended medical school at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA and completed his internal medicine residency and geriatric medicine fellowship at Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk, VA where he specialized in post-acute and long-term care medicine. His clinical practice focuses on post-acute and long-term care medicine with active medical directorship. He is assistant professor at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA where he is focusing on improving transitions of care and is actively involved in teaching trainees at all levels. At AMDA – The Society for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine – he is chair of the State Based Policy and Advocacy Subcommittee and chair of the Transitions of Care Subcommittee. He lives in Richmond, VA with his wife and two kids and enjoys spending time on home improvement projects.

Credit Information:

Activity Created: 3/2023
Credits Expire: 3/2026

1.75 CME
1.75 CMD Management

Credit Statements:

CME: AMDA – The Society for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine designates this enduring material for a maximum of 1.75 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)^TM. Physicians should only claim credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

AMDA – The Society for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

CMD: This self-study activity has been pre-approved by the American Board of Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine (ABPLM) for a total of 1.75 management hour(s) toward certification or recertification as a Certified Medical Director (CMD) in post-acute and long-term care medicine. The CMD program is administered by the ABPLM. Each physician should claim only those hours of credit actually spent on the activity.

ABIM Maintenance of Certification (MOC): This recording does not have MOC Points.

Visit the Continuing Education page for information on if and how you can claim credit/hours for AMDA’s education.

Disclosure Information:
The Society requires the disclosure of all speaker/faculty/planner’s relevant financial relationships; presence of off-label use of a device or medication; and discussion of any experimental, new or evolving topic prior to each accredited education activity.

If the learner perceives any bias toward a commercial product or service, advocation of unscientific approaches to diagnosis or therapy, or recommendation, treatment, or manners of practicing healthcare that are determined to have risks or dangers that outweigh the benefits or are known to be ineffective in the treatment of patients please report this to the Society’s staff.

Julie Gammack, MD, CMD (Planner & Speaker): Stockholder: Amarin
Kenya Rivas Velasquez, MD, CMD, FAAFP (Planner & Speaker): OptumRx: Stockholder
All other planners, speakers, and AMDA staff have no relationships with ineligible companies.

All relevant financial relationships have been identified and mitigated.

Get It!