Position on Medicare Participation
Medicare participation has been dropped as a requirement for SEE membership. Please read the press release (PDF document) issued by the Board during the 2007 Academy meeting.
Malpractice Study
Download and/or read the study (PDF document)
Policy Statement: Physician Relationship with Industry
Introduction
Relations between physicians and industry are being closely examined and even targeted by enforcement authorities. Recent government enforcement developments are causing many physicians to reevaluate their relationships with pharmaceutical and device manufacturers. Important developments include the recent TAP Pharmaceuticals investigation and settlement, as well as the HHS Office of Inspector General’s FY 2002 Work Plan. In particular, the OIG work plan indicates that the OIG plans to focus on the relationships between physicians and pharmaceutical companies. The OIG is concerned about drug companies providing anything of value to physicians and other health care providers as an inducement to order their products. The OIG intends to focus on what it estimates to be $12 billion annually spent by the drug companies on “physician detailing.” In the view of the OIG, such conduct creates both inherent conflicts of interest as well as kickback violations.
Policy Statement On Co-Management
Executive Summary
The recent proliferation of co-management relationships in connection with refractive surgery has prompted both government agencies (the Office of the Inspector General and several Medicare carriers) as well as professional societies (the Academy and ASCRS) to issue restrictive statements concerning co-management relationships where post-operative care is performed by an eye care professional other than the operating surgeon. According to these statements, co-management should be a rare exception, occurring only when the operating physician was unavailable to perform post-operative care, or when it was virtually impossible for the patient to return to the operating surgeon.
SEE believes that these policy statements are an unwarranted and overreaching reaction to certain extreme, and exceptional, conduct undertaken by a small number of ophthalmologists who have put economic considerations ahead of the interests of their patients. While SEE does not condone such practices, SEE believes that the response of the agencies and professional societies is misdirected. Instead, SEE believes that any policy statement relating to co-management must recognize the right of the patient to decide whether to participate in such a program subject to agreement by the operating surgeon that such decision does not compromise the patient’s best medical interest. At the same time, SEE recognizes that the patient's decision to obtain post-operative care from an optometrist must be made only when the patient is fully informed about co-management and that there may be instances where the patient's medical condition does not support a co-management arrangement.
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