IAHCSMM VIEWPOINT
Legislative updates on Massachusetts, Pennsylvania CS certifi cation bills
by Josephine Colacci, JD
he International Association of Health- care Central Service Materiel Manage- ment (IAHCSMM) is actively working to get Central Service (CS) technician certi- fi cation bills passed in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, and progress is being made in both states. The Massachusetts bill passed out of
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the Joint Public Health Committee on No- vember 25, 2015. The bill was sent to the Joint Health Care Financing Committee; however, when the Public Health commit- tee passed the bill out of its committee, it changed some of the language in our bill and gave us a new bill number, S.2070. We are working with the chairs of the Health Care Financing committee to change our language back to what was introduced. Our deadline to have our bill pass out of the Health Care Financing committee is April 27, 2016. The week of March 14, 2016, we met with legislators to discuss passing our legislation out of this committee. We met with 10 different legislators and two of them, Rep. Jeff Sanchez and Sen. James Welch, are the co-chairs of the Joint Health Care Financing Committee. Also, we received a letter of support from UMass Memorial Medical Center. For two years, we worked to attain a letter of support from this hospital and, fortunately, their letter arrived while we were meeting with legislators. We now have four different hos- pitals in the state supporting our legislation. Our members in Massachusetts have been reaching out to their legislators, asking them
to encourage legislators on the Joint Health Care Financing Committee to vote favorably to pass the bill. As of the date of this publica- tion, 109 members have sent emails, which equates to 123 different legislators being contacted (there are 200 total in the legisla- ture) and 318 emails sent. I make follow-up phone calls to the legislators’ offi ces, asking if they received the emails and whether or not they will support our legislation. Most of the time, the offi ce staff will not commit a legislator to a yes or no regarding our issue; however, the important thing is to keep the issue in front of them. If we are successful in passing the bill out
of Health Care Financing committee, the bill will be sent to the Ways and Means Com- mittee. Our bill must fi nish its committee assignments and pass out of the House and Senate, and be signed by the Governor prior to December 31, 2016. The Massachusetts Chapter for Central Service Professionals held its spring pro- gram on March 19, 2016. At the program, State Sen. Michael Rush, a co-sponsor of our legislation, spoke to attendees and explained that if we want our legislation to pass, every- one must contact their state elected offi cials. He described how easy it is for individuals to contact their elected offi cials and also reminded that elected offi cials want to hear from their constituents.
Progress in Pennsylvania Our lobbyist in Pennsylvania arranged for us to meet with legislators the week
of February 8. Two IAHCSMM members attended the meetings with me — Dawn Olsen, RN, and Amanda Masters, RN. We met with legislators who serve on the House Health Committee and asked them to bring our bill up for a committee hearing by this spring. During one of our meetings, a legisla-
tor explained that the reason he signed onto our bill as a co-sponsor was because his father developed a hospital-acquired infection. We are hopeful that we will get a committee hearing this spring. I will be traveling back to Harrisburg to meet with more legislators the week of April 11. This summer, the IAHCSMM Advocacy Committee and I will be looking at several different states for legislation in 2017. The number of new states will depend on what happens with our Massachusetts and Penn- sylvania bills. It will also depend on what the state of Tennessee decides to do with its CS study bill. The states leading our list at this time
are Vermont, New Hampshire and Rhode Island. We are considering these three because we have had success in neighbor- ing states and would like to keep up the momentum in this geographic region. Currently, three states in the nation require certifi cation of CS technicians: New Jersey, New York and Connecticut. HPN
Josephine Colacci, JD, serves as IAHCSMM’s Government Affairs Director.
Karen Nauss, Massachusetts Sen. Michael Rush, Mark Duro and Josephine Colacci. 32 May 2016 • HEALTHCARE PURCHASING NEWS •
hpnonline.com
Photo credit: Jo M. Wood
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