Advocacy Successes
Physician Advocacy Successes
Good health policy is made with physicians in the discussion.
MSDC, working with its members, partners, and other organizations, has won major policy victories to help its members practice medicine. Below is a sampling of those victories. Do you want to be a vital part of the next policy victory helping improve the health of the District? Contact us today.
24th Council Period (2021-2022)
Opioid Policy
- MSDC was added to the opioid fund oversight panel by the Council in its legislation authorizing the oversight body
Scope of Practice
- MSDC supported legislation to ban the sale of flavored electronic smoking devices and restrict the sale of electronic smoking devices.
- Working with a coalition, MSDC added funding to the DC budget to support the hiring of more license specialists to help with the delay in processing medical licenses.
Women's Health
- B24-143, to regulate certified midwives, passed the Council with MSDC's support
23rd Council Period (2019-2020) [see update for entire Council period]
Health Equity
- Mayor Muriel Bowser signs into law the Electronic Medical Order for Scope of Treatment Registry Amendment Act of 2019. The eMOST Registry Amendment Act permits the creation of an electronic database of advanced directive wishes for District residents that can be tied into the health information exchange.
- Mayor Bowser signs into law the School Sunscreen Safety Temporary Amendment Act of 2019. The bill permits students to bring and apply sunscreen during the 2019-2020 school year.
- MSDC comments on the importance of funding United Medical Center (UMC) and health facilities in Wards 7 and 8 in the mayor's budget. Those comments are used almost verbatim in CM Trayon White's comments advocating for funding of United Medical Center.
Scope of Practice
- DC Health publishes draft regulations removing the 3 mandatory CME hours for HIV/AIDS awareness and replaces them with a requirement to fulfill 10% of mandatory CME hours with a topic from a public health priority list. DC Health then waived the requirement for 2020.
- The Strengthening Reproductive Health Protections Act of 2020 is signed into law with MSDC support. The bill prohibits government interference in reproductive decisions between a patient and doctor, and prohibits employers from penalizing physicians for practicing reproductive medicine outside of their work hours.
- The Mayor's Commission on Healthcare Systems Transformation releases its final recommendations. One recommendation is for the District to explore options to make providing health care more affordable, including financial relief for higher malpractice insurance rates.
- The Council removes "telephone" from the list of prohibited types of telemedicine to allow physicians and other providers to be reimbursed for telephone telemedicine appointments after MSDC and health community advocacy.
- MSDC worked with the Council to modify onerous language in the Health Care Reporting Amendment Act that potentially would have penalized physicians from seeking help for substance abuse or addiction issues.
Opioid/Drug Policy
- The Department of Health Care Finance (DHCF) waives prior authorization for key medication assisted treatments (MAT) treating substance use disorder patients in Medicaid.
- The Mayor signed into law The Access to Biosimilars Amendment Act of 2019, a top MSDC priority as it would help prescribers to prescribe more cost-effective drugs for patients.
Behavioral Health
- The Behavioral Health Parity Act of 2017, a major priority for MSDC and DCPA, officially becomes law. The legislation requires all health benefit plans offered by an insurance carrier to meet the federal requirements of the Wellstone/Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008.
22nd Council Period (2017-2018)
Health Equity
- The District Council passes B22-1001, The Health Insurance Marketplace Improvement Amendment Act of 2018. The bill prohibits the sale of Short Term, Limited Duration health plans and Association Health Plans (AHPs) in the DC Health Benefits Exchange.
Scope of Practice
- DC joins 28 other states in the Interstate Medical Licensure Compact with B22-177 becoming law. The IMLC is designed to ease physician licensure in multiple states.
Women's Health
- The Maternal Mortality Review Committee is established by law. The Committee is responsible for finding solutions to maternal health crisis in the District. District physicians are an important part of this vital committee.
- B22-106, The Defending Access to Women's Health Care Services Amendment Act, becomes law. The act requires insurers to cover health care services like breast cancer screening and STI screenings without cost-sharing.
21st Council Period (2015-2016)
Opioid Policy
- Right before the Council adjourned for the session, it passed B21-32, the Specialty Drug Copayment Limitation Act. The bill limits cost shifting by payers for prescription drugs.
Behavioral Health
- B21-0007 passes the Council. The Behavioral Health Coordination of Care Amendment Act of 2016 permitted the disclosing of mental health information between a mental health facility and the health professional caring for the patient.
Women's Health
- MSDC was proud to have worked on B21-20. The law requires payers to cover up to 12 months of prescription contraception, advancing women's health and equality.
Dr. Edwin Chapman: Child of Determined People
Meet MSDC member Howard University alumnus Dr. Edwin Chapman
As a young boy, Dr. Edwin Chapman was shaped by leaders around him, leaders who happened to be his parents.
History has recorded the impact of his father, Joseph Conrad Chapman, Sr. on the African American community. He was the first director of the Urban League of Northwest Indiana, Inc. in 1945.
During his four-year tenure there, he made significant contributions to the city of Gary, Indiana. Under his direction, St. Mary’s Mercy and Methodist Hospitals permitted the use of their facilities by Black physicians. Dr. Martin H. Lovell and Dr. Benjamin Grant were the first African Americans to join the staff thanks to the efforts of Mr. Chapman.
Mr. Chapman helped paved the way for his sons to pursue medical degrees. Dr. Chapman is one of five children. His older brother also practiced medicine and retired at age 83.
Dr. Chapman’s mother also played an influential role in her community as an elementary school teacher for more than thirty years. She thrived helping children learn to read and helped to open the doors to their future.
Throughout his career, Dr. Chapman has worked diligently not only in pursuit of his passion, but also to live up to the expectations set of his parents.
“Growing up in Gary, I was well aware of the civil rights movement but was not directly involved with it even though my father, Joseph Chapman, Sr., was deeply immersed in racial issues as the first executive director of the Gary Urban League. He entered that position in 1945 facing both a strike, where white students refused to attend schools with Black students, as well as a hospital system that would not allow qualified Black physicians on staff. Through the Urban League, he was able to work with the leadership of the schools, churches, hospitals, U.S. Steel, and the Gary Post Tribune to negotiate solutions to both problems with the amiable integration of the schools and hospitals by 1947. Both of my parents were professional educators, but very pragmatic as activists, and as a result I did not experience any personal conflicts as a young man in Gary,” shared Dr. Chapman.
After high school, Dr. Chapman followed his oldest brother, Dr. Joseph Chapman, Jr. and enrolled in Howard University in Washington, D.C. in as an undergraduate in 1964, followed by Howard University College of Medicine in 1969. “D.C. wasn’t as cosmopolitan as a New York or Boston,” said Dr. Chapman. “The neighborhood was structured in a way that felt similar to Gary. I was comfortable living on campus and being in the surrounding community,” he added.
With his path towards medicine well marked, Dr. Chapman selected his internal medicine specialty based on his interests. “I am a problem solver and internal medicine is like solving problems. It is a little bit like being a medical investigator,” he said.
His interest in solving problems served as one of his greatest assets as his worked evolved over the years.
While working as the medical director for a new methadone clinic in the early 2000s, he was amazed at what he saw. “It became clear to me that so-called toxic stress was a major driver of addiction in the African American community,” he said. He began to see the need to merge primary care and substance use disorder treatment in the same facility with the help of on-site mental health services. “Our African American patient population was suffering from anxiety, depression, racism, among other things. They were self-medicating their problems. We needed to start treating the whole person,” he said.
Ward 6 is the theatre where the opioid epidemic battles rage and Dr. Chapman has taken the helm to rally his colleagues to join him in the fight. Armed with lab coats, knowledge, and passion, he has been a mainstay in the ward for over four decades, dedicated to combating addiction disorders through mental health treatment.
For Dr. Chapman, the correlation is clear, “Mental health and substance use disorder are parallel issues. Due to stigma in the patient population that I work with, people feel abandoned by both society and their families. We need to address this as community wide collaborative issue rather than an individual problem.”
For those with insurance, Dr. Chapman has observed some success; however, working to improve insurance coverage for social services and peer support services is another obstacle Dr. Chapman is willing to take on. “We need to change the payment system so that payment is provided for these essential support services as a part of the medical setting including social workers and people with lived experiences: advocacy, housing, transportation, employment, as well as an empathic ear. Social Determinants of Health are just as important as state-of-the-art medications.”
To maintain his own health and wellbeing to tackle such daunting obstacles, Dr. Chapman enjoys his personal time. “Medicine is my passion, but I recognize the need to maintain my own mental health. That means spending time watching sporting events, concerts, plays, movies, and a good meal with family and friends.”
He and his wife, a retired RN, who left retirement to help administer COVID vaccines, have two have two grown children and two grandsons.
Dr. Chapman joined MSDC after a meeting with the Executive Vice President, Robert Hay. As an MSDC member, Dr. Chapman has gained a platform to champion physicians to become leaders in the D.C. opioid epidemic. “I was very impressed with Robert and his dedication to physician advocacy. MSDC orchestrates positive changes for patients and physicians that we can't possibly achieve without structured collaboration.”
Do you know a physician who should be profiled in the MSDC Spotlight Series? Submit a nomination to Robert Hay at hay@msdc.org, for a future story. MSDC membership is encouraged for featured physicians.
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