Connective News Issue....
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.c The Associated Press
By SANDRA SOBIERAJ
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) -- First lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, calling her fight
``a personal one,'' is urging lawmakers to move quickly to bar insurance
companies from denying extended hospital stays to mastectomy patients.
``Give back to doctors the control and authority over their patients that
they should have,'' Mrs. Clinton said Wednesday of legislation modeled
after the law enacted last year to guarantee 48 hours of hospitalization
for new mothers.
She added a plug for federal breast-cancer research funds and the
president's proposal for free annual mammograms for Medicare patients.
At an emotional East Room gathering that left the first lady shaking
her head in disbelief, cancer survivor Connie Shorter told of being
discharged from the hospital groggy and in pain eight hours after her
breast was removed last November.
``The women of America who face the fight against breast cancer should
not fight to stay in the hospital a day or two after surgery to complete
the medical care they need,'' said Shorter of Troy, Mich.
Debra R. Judelson, president of the American Medical Women's Association,
blamed insurance companies and managed-care plans: ``They're making
decisions that don't have the patient's best interests at heart. They
have stockholders and CEO's they have to answer to.''
The bill, which President Clinton endorsed in his State of the Union
address, would force insurance companies to pay for at least 48 hours
of hospitalization for a mastectomy patient -- unless she and her
physician agree it's unnecessary.
Critics say the federal government, through piecemeal mandates on child
birth and mastectomy, is wrongly assuming a role in medical decisions
and intruding into the doctor-patient relationship.
Mrs. Clinton conceded nearly as much on Wednesday. ``Ideally we would
not need to seek legislation to end specific troubling practices like
this,'' she said. ``But as long as women continue to find themselves
in the nightmarish situation ... then action must be taken.''
``This fight for the passage of this bill has become a personal one,
'' said the first lady, whose mother-in-law, Virginia Kelley, died of
breast cancer in 1994.
Other advocates hoped for a more universal guarantee that insurance
cost-cutting would not dictate medical practice. ``Let's hope we get
beyond going procedure by procedure,'' said Eleanor Smeal of the
Feminist Majority Foundation.
In conjunction with the White House event, Health and Human Services
Secretary Donna Shalala, who sat on stage beside Shorter, sent a letter
Wednesday warning 350 managed-care plans that serve Medicare patients
not to arbitrarily limit mastectomy hospital stays. The HHS directive
did not suggest any particular minimum length of stay.
Rep. Bill Thomas, R-Calif., chairman of the House Ways and Means health
subcommittee, contended that quality in managed care should be left to
a quality commission that Clinton promised during his re-election
campaign. Supporting the 48-hour legislation before that, Thomas said,
``goes directly against what he indicated he was going to do.''
But Mrs. Clinton urged her mostly female audience of health activists
and cancer survivors now to ``do all that you can in the next weeks and
months to contact members of Congress.''
Turning to the four senators on stage, Mrs. Clinton smiled and added,
``I hope we're all able to meet back here in a few months -- or even
less, perhaps, senators -- for the president to sign this legislation.''
Sen. Richard Bryan, D-Nev., one of those in attendance, predicted after
ward that Congress could have the bill on Clinton's desk by early
summer.
AP-NY-02-13-97 0315EST
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Regards,
Warren |
