[MMA News Now, November 10, 2011] Minnesota physicians are bringing forward two resolutions at the AMA 2011 Interim Meeting of the House of Delegates in New Orleans November 12-15.  The resolutions relate to the proper use of the term physician in coding guidelines and whether physicians should be required to take a secure examination as part of maintenance of certification programs.

The Minnesota delegation to the American Medical Association helps set national policy at the AMA Annual and Interim meetings. This year’s delegation includes AMA Delegates John Van Etta, M.D.; Ray Christensen, M.D.; Sally Trippel, M.D.; Ken Crabb, M.D., and Paul Matson, M.D. The AMA alternate delegates include John Abenstein, M.D., David Estrin, M.D., Ben Whitten, M.D., and Will Nicholson, M.D.

Maintenance of certification tests
Resolution 911 calls for the AMA to work with the American Board of Medical Specialties to remove the requirement for a secure examination as part of their Maintenance of Certification program.

Physicians with time-limited board certifications have to take an exam every seven to 10 years. But now that maintaining board certification also requires completing learning modules, computer-based simulations, and practice quality assessments, physicians are questioning whether an exam is necessary.

Linda Van Etta, M.D., an infectious disease specialist at St. Luke’s Hospital in Duluth, is a supporter of the resolution who think exams should no longer be required for maintaining board certification. Recertification tests measure factual recall, not diagnostic reasoning, she argues.

The recall must be done without access to outside references, which contradicts what physicians are encouraged to do in the real world—rely on good sources of information instead of on memory.  The tests also don’t assess important competencies such as professionalism and procedural skills, and preparing for them takes time away from seeing patients, which in this era of production-based medicine largely determines a physician’s compensation.

Read Test Anxiety in Minnesota Medicine to learn more about the issue.

CPT use of the term physician
Resolution 602 calls for the AMA to ensure that Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) Editorial Panel employs the term physician in a way consistent with AMA policy that defines the term “physician” to include only doctors of medicine and doctors of osteopathic medicine.

The resolution is in response to the fact that the CPT Editorial Panel, at its June 2011 meeting, approved initiating a review of and potential revisions to the CPT code set that distinguishes clinical staff from physicians and other qualified health care professionals.

As part of that process, CPT advisors participating in this project defined, for purposes of the systematic review, that a “’Physician’ includes professionals that are currently allowed to report E/M services in the Medicare fee schedule, i.e., RNP, PA, CNM and as state law allows CNS.”

Minnesota is a co-sponsor of this resolution. The American Society of Anesthesiologists is the main sponsor.