WALTHAM
– The Massachusetts Medical
Society has adopted into organizational policy several resolutions,
including support of timely, and systematic monitoring of fetal and
infant mortality in the state; food insecurity screening; opposition to
concealed carry reciprocity; and opposition to state
or federal legislation that attempts to criminalize self-induced
abortion.
Physician-members
of MMS’s House
of Delegates attended the organization's 2018 Annual Meeting April 26-28
at the World Trade Center and considered a variety of resolutions
proposed by members. Resolutions accepted by the House of Delegates
became organizational policy.
Following are some of the newly
adopted policies impacting public health or health care delivery in the Commonwealth and nationally.
Fetal and Infant Mortality
The Massachusetts Medical Society
will work with appropriate stakeholders, regulators and policy makers to establish monitoring of fetal and infant mortality.
According
to the most recent data
(2014) from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, the state has
the lowest infant mortality rate in the nation, but concern lies in the
disparity of occurrence along racial and ethnic lines.
The infant death rate in 2014 among
non-Hispanic blacks was 7.3 per 1,000 births, while that number is 3.4 among non-Hispanic whites.
Variances
in infant mortality rate
exist also in communities within the Commonwealth. In 2014, the
communities of Fitchburg (9.9 per 1,000), Chelsea (8.5), and Worcester
(7.4) had some of the highest IMRs in the state.
Food Insecurity Screening
The
Medical Society’s new policy
encourages routine food insecurity screening by health care providers,
their organizations, and schools, with validated food insecurity
screening tools or larger screening sets for social determinants of
health that incorporate screening for food insecurity.
The
society believes that food
insecurity screening can be a common-sense component of conversation on
the broad subject of social determinants of health and that intervention
can improve health, especially in those with chronic conditions.
Concealed Carry
The Massachusetts Medical Society
“opposes all forms of ‘concealed carry reciprocity’ federal legislation that would require all states to recognize concealed
carry permits granted by other states and allow
citizens with concealed gun carry permits in one state to carry guns
across state lines into states that have stricter laws” and will
encourage the American
Medical Association to do the same.
The
policies regarding concealed
carry laws are consistent with and build upon the organization’s current
policies involving firearms, which exist to reduce the number of deaths
and accidents attributed to guns, make gun ownership safer, promoting
gun safety education, encouraging research
that will help to understand the risk factors related to gun violence
and offering education to help physicians and other health care
professionals facilitate gun safety conversations with patients.
According
to the U.S. Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention, Massachusetts has the lowest rate of
firearm deaths in the country. MMS members speaking on behalf of this
resolution at the Annual Meeting expressed concern that federal
legislation on concealed carry reciprocity would put people
in Massachusetts at increased risk of firearm violence, despite the
state’s current robust gun laws.
Opposition to the Criminalization
of Self-Induced Abortion
The
Massachusetts Medical Society
will advocate against any legislative efforts or laws in Massachusetts
or federally to criminalize self-induced abortion and the MMS delegation
to the American Medical Association will submit a resolution to the AMA
urging it to adopt similar policy.
Self-induced
abortion is a rare
occurrence, but the Massachusetts Medical Society contends that emphasis
should be not on criminalizing women but on a broad spectrum of
societal failings that lead to unintended pregnancy, such as lack of
access to appropriate contraceptive care.
The weekend featured as a guest
Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, who delivered the annual
Shattuck Lecture of
the New England Journal of Medicine as a part of the society’s Annual
Education Program. Gates then joined Michelle Williams, SM, ScD, dean
of the faculty at Harvard
T.H. Chan School of Public Health, for a discussion on global epidemics.
The
Massachusetts Medical Society,
the Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation of Harvard Law School
and Community Servings of Boston hosted a “Food is Medicine” listening
session during which attendees from the health care arena learned about
the state’s first-in-the-nation Food is Medicine
Plan to assess the need for and access to medically tailored food and
nutrition interventions for patients with complex health and social
needs. Participants also responded to a series of questions regarding
current practices to screen for food insecurity,
major challenges to such screening and recommendations for the MMS to
address this issue going forward.
The
Annual Meeting also included
a “Stop the Bleed” educational training session, the annual awards
luncheon, an International Medical Graduates Annual Reception, an LGBTQ mentoring and networking reception, and an ethics forum.
