Month: April 2018

The Development and Certification of Decision Aids: Promoting Shared Decision-Making for Patients with Serious Illness

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

The Development and Certification of Decision Aids: Promoting Shared Decision-Making for Patients with Serious Illness
April 18, 2018 8:30 AM – 4:30 PM
Wasserstein Hall, Milstein East AB (2036)
Harvard Law School, 1585 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA

Decision aids can be highly-effective tools to promote shared decision making and support patients in becoming engaged participants in their healthcare.  Join us for the first-ever convening with leaders behind a Washington experiment in certifying decision aids, as state officials, health systems, and on-the-ground implementation experts share lessons learned and discuss policy recommendations for national or statewide approaches to decision aid certification.  

Program Overview

Person-centered care presents a unique opportunity to achieve the Quadruple Aim, especially during serious illness when people are the most vulnerable. Building on the work of NQF and others, it is now clear that healthcare purchasers (states, plans, care providers) committed to person-centered care should also be committed to shared decision-making.

A number of policy initiatives have sought to increase the use of decision aids as an effective way to further shared decision making and person-centered care. Washington is the first – and so far only – state to recognize and act on this opportunity by establishing a process to certify decision aids across the health continuum, including during serious illness when people are the most vulnerable. The program will examine the Washington experience and also explore policy barriers for replication of the Washington model at the state and national levels.

This event is free and open to the public, but seating is limited and registration is required. Register now!

This event is part of the Project for Advanced Care and Health Policy, a collaboration between the Petrie-Flom Center and the Coalition to Transform Advanced Care (C-TAC), a non-partisan, non-profit alliance of over 130 national organizations dedicated to being a catalyst to change the health delivery system, empower consumers, enhance provider capacity and improve public and private policies in advanced illness care.

Learn more about the event here!

HHS Panel Advances C-TAC and AAHPM’s Payment Models

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Mark Sterling

The Petrie-Flom Center collaborates with the Coalition to Transform Advanced Care (C-TAC) on the Project on Advanced Care and Health Policy.

Last week, a panel of experts convened by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recommended approval of C-TAC’s “Advanced Care Model”, designed to improve quality and care for individuals with serious and advanced illness. The expert panel, known as the Physician-Focused Payment Model Advisory Committee or PTAC, was created by MACRA.

“With 10,000 Baby Boomers becoming eligible for Medicare every day, many of whom have or will have serious or advanced illness, we must find a way to provide quality care to this population,” said Tom Koutsoumpas, Co-Founder and Co-Chair of C-TAC, during his opening remarks. “C-TAC is honored to stand at the forefront of this exciting opportunity to transform the healthcare system. This is the first step in changing how we care for people most in need in this country.”

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TOMORROW! Health in the Headlines: Reporting on Health Policy in the Trump Era

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Health in the Headlines: Reporting on Health Policy in the Trump Era
April 4, 2018 12:00 PM
Wasserstein Hall, Milstein East (2036)
Harvard Law School, 1585 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA

Join the Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation for a panel discusison with leading health care journalists about the rapidly shifting health policy landscape in Washington DC. The panel will discuss the high drama of a tumultuous year in health policy that has seen repeated congressional attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, the resignation of a cabinet secretary amidst scandal, and a steady effort to undermine Obama-era priorities. Further, the panel will explore the role of journalism in modern policy-making, and how social media impacts the dialogue.

Sponsored by the Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation at Harvard Law School; the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School; the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government; the Harvard PhD Program in Health Policy; the Harvard T. H. Chan Student Association (HCSA) at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health; and the Harvard Health Law Society at Harvard Law School. 

Learn more about the event here!

Was March a Turning Point for Tobacco Regulation in the U.S.?

Nicholas J. Diamond Leave a comment

March was an important month for tobacco control in the U.S. While historically less progressive than other countries in regulating tobacco products, three recent developments offer encouraging signs of change. They also remind us of the critical role that the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) plays in public health policymaking.

The Three ANPRMs
Last month, the FDA released three advanced notices of proposed rulemaking (ANPRM) on tobacco-related products. An ANPRM is a formal invitation for stakeholders to submit comments before a federal agency issues a proposed rule. In practical terms, an ANPRM enables stakeholders to weigh in on, and even potentially shape, a forthcoming policy by responding to specific issues for input.

Released on March 16, the first ANPRM addresses the development of a tobacco product standard for a maximum nicotine level in cigarettes. The FDA seeks comment on a number of policy design considerations including, among others: the merits of various maximum nicotine levels (e.g., 0.5mg nicotine/g); to which products a maximum nicotine level should apply (e.g., combusted cigarettes, cigars, pipe tobacco); and whether to use a stepped-down, or gradual, reduction in maximum nicotine levels.

Importantly, the FDA highlights factors that could reduce the benefits of a future policy and seeks comment on how to addresses them. For example, current smokers could switch to a tobacco product not covered under the policy or use that non-covered product in addition to the currently used (covered) product. Similarly, current smokers could increase the number of cigarettes smoked to maintain an equivalent level of nicotine overall. Read More

Another Blow to Tort Reform in Florida: Statute Allowing Defendants in Medical Malpractice Suits to Hold Ex Parte Interviews with the Aggrieved Patient’s Care Providers Declared Unconstitutional

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By Alex Stein

STEIN on Medical Malpractice has recently published a survey of noteworthy court decisions in the field for 2017. This survey includes an important decision, Weaver v. Myers, 229 So.3d 1118 (Fla. 2017), that voided Florida statute allowing defendants in medical malpractice suits to hold ex parte interviews with the aggrieved patient’s care providers.

The case at bar involved a medical malpractice suit filed in connection with the patient’s allegedly wrongful death. The defendants attempted to take advantage of Florida’s pre-suit discovery statute, Fla. Stat. Ann. §§ 766.106, 766.1065. This statute authorized defense attorneys to hold secret ex parte interviews with all doctors and organizations that have ever provided treatment to the deceased patient.

The Florida Supreme Court decided that this statute violates the broad constitutional right to privacy under Fla. Const. art. 1, § 23. The Court reasoned that “The ex parte secret interview provisions of sections 766.106 and 766.1065 fail to protect Florida citizens from even accidental disclosures of confidential medical information that falls outside the scope of the claim because there would be no one present on the claimant’s behalf to ensure that the potential defendant, his insurers, his attorneys, or his experts do not ask for disclosure of information from a former treating health care provider that is totally irrelevant to the claim.” The Court also clarified that “the right to privacy in the Florida Constitution attaches during the life of a citizen and is not retroactively destroyed by death. Here, the constitutional protection operates in the specific context of shielding irrelevant, protected medical history and other private information from the medical malpractice litigation process. Furthermore, in the wrongful death context, standing in the position of the decedent, the administrator of the decedent’s estate has standing to assert the decedent’s privacy rights. Finally, the Legislature unconstitutionally conditioned a plaintiff’s right of access to courts for redress of injuries caused by medical malpractice, whether in the wrongful death or personal injury context, on the claimant’s waiver of the constitutional right to privacy.”

2018 Petrie-Flom Center Annual Conference: Beyond Disadvantage: Disability, Law, and Bioethics

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

2018 Petrie-Flom Center Annual Conference: Beyond Disadvantage: Disability, Law, and Bioethics
June 1, 2018 8:00 AM – 5:00 PM
Wasserstein Hall, Milstein East ABC (2036)
Harvard Law School, 1585 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA

“Congress acknowledged that society’s accumulated myths and fears about disability and disease are as handicapping as are the physical limitations that flow from actual impairment.” Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., School Bd. of Nassau, Fl. v. Arline, 480 U.S. 273 (1987).

The Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School is pleased to announce plans for our 2018 annual conference, entitled: “Beyond Disadvantage: Disability, Law, and Bioethics.” This year’s conference is organized in collaboration with the Harvard Law School Project on Disability.

Conference Description

Historically and across societies people with disabilities have been stigmatized and excluded from social opportunities on a variety of culturally specific grounds. These justifications include assertions that people with disabilities are biologically defective, less than capable, costly, suffering, or fundamentally inappropriate for social inclusion. Rethinking the idea of disability so as to detach being disabled from inescapable disadvantage has been considered a key to twenty-first century reconstruction of how disablement is best understood.

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