Make Your Voice Heard! (See below for several ways to Take Action now!!)
Support the Access to Quality Diabetes Education Act of 2015 - H.R. 1726 and S.1345
Send letters to your congressmen today encouraging them to support and co-sponsor bills:
H.R. 1726 Click to take action
S. 1345 Click to take action
These bills will help our practice and people with diabetes. They will:
- Designate CDEs as Medicare-approved providers of DSMT services;
- Facilitate the ability of CDEs to work with various physician practice groups or offices to provide regular diabetes clinics on site as needed;
- Provide diabetes education in an approved culturally appropriate local community setting, and
- Help reduce diabetes-related minority health disparities due to insufficient access to diabetes education and training in some communities.
Why do we need this legislative fix?
When Congress enacted DSMT as a Medicare benefit in 1997, the legislative language was broadly referred as “Medicare providers” of DSMT. Since ‘Diabetes Educators’ were not named as “Medicare providers,” they do not exist in the statute and cannot be reimbursed by Medicare.
Ensuring that credentialed diabetes educators are recognized as DSMT providers will promote greater quality of care in the Medicare program. Federal recognition of credentialed diabetes educators as Medicare DSMT providers will likely strengthen state Medicaid DSMT programs.
Suggested tweets
Show your support for the Access to Quality Diabetes Education Act of 2015 on social media!
If you have Twitter, tweet this message: I support the Access to Quality Diabetes Education Act #DiabetesEd4All @RepEdWhitfield @SenatorShaheen
If you have Facebook, post this message and tag AADE, Congressman Whitfield and Senator Shaheen: I support the Access to Quality Diabetes Education Act #DiabetesEd4All Congressman Ed Whitfield Senator Jeanne Shaheen
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American Association of Diabetes Educators
200 West Madison Street, Suite 800 | Chicago, Illinois 60606
Ph: 800.338.3633 | Fax: 312.424.2427
Please send any comments about this email to marketing@aadenet.org
More Information:
Dear CB Leaders:
I am updating you on a campaign which has been unleashed on our bill, The Access to Quality Diabetes Education Act of 2015 (Senate Bill 1345 and House Bill 1726) by a coalition of self-defined nutrition specialists, health coaches and wellness experts.
As you know, we have been working tirelessly to pass our bill for years. You have been engaged in writing letters to legislators, visiting their offices in district and in DC and in activating your members. Because of your hard work on this bill, however, we have attracted the attention of individuals who want to keep the status quo and who want to deny thousands of diabetes patients’ access to the best DSMT.
This coalition is making gross misrepresentations and distortions of our bill to the media and to legislators on Capitol Hill.
The opponents of our bill are falsely claiming to the media and Capitol Hill that our bill, “… would slash the number of qualified Diabetes Education providers in half, and make it harder for Medicare patients to access the care they need.”
This accusation is absurd but for the fact that we have worked too hard to have our legislation held up any longer. We must take these accusations seriously.
We need you to take action immediately. Please write your legislators again, asking them to support our bill .
To send an email to your congressional Representatives and Senators, respectively, please click on the links below:
H.R. 1726<https://secure2.convio.net/aade/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=227> Click to take action
S. 1345 <https://secure2.convio.net/aade/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=225> Click to take action
Or, even more importantly, write them on Twitter.
Just post this message:
I support the Access to Quality Diabetes Education Act #DiabetesEd4All @RepEdWhitfield @SenatorShaheen
Because of the hard work you have invested in our bill and the growing list of sponsors we have, others now feel threatened and want to kill it.
In order to stop this, we need you to take action right now. If you have any questions, please contact me.
Kurt Anderson
Director of Federal and State Advocacy
American Association of Diabetes Educators
200 W Madison St., Suite 800
Chicago, IL 60606-3468
(312) 601-4873 direct
kanderson@aadenet.org<mailto:kanderson@aadenet.org>
Peggy Pellazzari and Pat Linekin of NYSCB and ADA Members recently met with Congressman Peter King to discuss Diabetes Advocacy!!
(See photo)....