American Brain Coalition
The Society of Biological Psychiatry has recently made the decision to become an Association Member of the American Brain Coalition. The American Brain Coalition is a non-profit organization comprised of some of the United States leading professional neurological, neuroscience, psychological, and psychiatric associations and patient organizations.
The goal of the organization is to garner support for the study of brain and behavioral disorders, advance understanding of the brain, and reduce the burden of brain disorders through public advocacy.
Visit the website for the American Brain Coalition at
http://www.americanbraincoalition.org/ to learn more about their vision and how together we can advocate for increased support of research that will lead to better treatments for our patients as well as a national commitment towards finding cures for individuals with disabling neurological and psychiatric disorders.
The Society will notify members of communications from the American Brain Coalition via our newsletter, but we encourage you to check this site frequently to keep updated on the latest initiatives of the American Brain Coalition. We will list the communications to members below.
Recent announcements to ABC Members:
December 18, 2009
Please take the time to tell the NIH how you find and use health information by responding to the questions at http://nihhealthinfoRFI.nih.gov by WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 30, 2009. Your responses will help NIH understand which health topics you're interested in, so NIH can prepare more effective health information and get it to the people who need it. The questions -- called the Consumer Health Information Request for Information (RFI) -- can be completed online in English or downloaded from their Web site in Spanish. The RFI was developed through a partnership between NIH's Office of Communication and Public Liaison and the NIH Director's Council of Public Representatives. The RFI closes Wednesday, December 30, 2009. For more information, please visit http://nihhealthinfoRFI.nih.gov.
December 16, 2009
Please find an American Brain Coalition informational paper on health care reform that you can read and feel free to share with your membership. It is located on the ABC web site at http://www.americanbraincoalition.org/go/advocacy. As Congress is currently debating health care reform proposals, the American Brain Coalition--at the behest of some of its members--wanted to provide a list of points we believe our members should consider about healthcare reform and its impact on the quality of life for neurological and psychiatric patients and their families. While not all of the ABC's members think that our issuance of the paper is appropriate, a majority Board vote at the fall meeting calls for us to circulate the informational paper to all members. We hope that you find the paper informative and valuable. If you have any comments or questions, please feel free to contact me (akupferman@americanbraincoalition.org).
December 11, 2009
The health care debate is moving fast in the U.S. Senate, and you have the opportunity to affect change for millions of Americans. Please urge your Senators to support an amendment that would include neurology amongst specialties eligible for primary care incentives in the Senate health reform bill, to increase patient access to care. Currently, neurology is not listed as a specialty eligible for primary care incentives in section 5501 of the Senate Health Reform Bill, even though family practice, internal medicine, pediatrics, and geriatrics are included. This would mean that neurologists are the only physicians who regularly manage and coordinate care who are not eligible for the bonus. Earlier this week, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) introduced an amendment to the health care bill that would add neurologists to this list, enabling millions of Americans living with devastating neurological conditions to get the proper care they need. Excluding neurologists could have long-lasting ramifications for neurological patients. Sen. Klobuchar's amendment has strong bipartisan support from Sens. Susan Collins (R-ME) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH). Please contact both of your senators today and ask them to support Sen. Klobuchar's amendment (H.R. 3590), and ask the senators to let the Senate Finance Committee know of their support. The ABC is pleased to provide CapWiz, our online legislative action center, where you can easily send a letter to your Senators today (http://capwiz.com/americanbraincoalition/home/). Click on “Support Neurology in Critical Health Care Amendment”. For those organizations that have their own legislative action site and issue and alert on this, please report your response numbers back to me in coming weeks. Thank you in advance for your support.
