Turning Good Ideas into Good Legislation for PA

Ideas for legislation come from lots of different places, but sometimes the best ideas for come from my constituents who have problems we can address in Harrisburg. Last week, I introduced two bills in the House of Representatives dealing with health issues based on the real-life experiences of my constituents.

The first bill, . Hospitals would be required to perform a pulse oximetry screening on newborn babies, which is a non-invasive screening that utilizes a sensor placed on an infant’s foot to measure the amount of oxygen in his bloodstream.

Although some hospitals already perform pulse oximetry newborn screenings, they are not required by law to do so. Meanwhile, an estimated 280 infants with an undiagnosed congenital heart defect are discharged each year from hospitals in the United States.

I learned about this issue after a constituent told me about their newborn daughter, who was rushed to the hospital because of a heart defect that likely would have been detected if this test had been given at birth. In today’s age of technology, and with advanced screening tools at our disposal, we should be doing all we can to ensure our children get proper screening now to avoid tragedy later.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 12 percent of babies born each year have one of seven critical congenital heart defects. Newborns that are not screened for such defects are at greater risk of death or life-long disabilities.

Congenital heart defects are responsible for nearly 24 percent of infant deaths in the United States. It makes sense to screen newborns right away so they can receive the specialized care they critically need while they are already in the hospital. The cost is very low—estimated at less than $10—which is a bargain when you consider the low cost of catching a heart defect early as compared to the high cost of fixing it later.

The Pennsylvania Newborn Screening And Follow Up Technical Advisory Board recently recommended that screening for critical congenital cyanotic heart disease using the best available technology be added to the Pennsylvania state mandated newborn screening and follow-up panels.

The second bill, HB 2261, also known as the Fairness in Copayment Act, is designed to limit co-payments and co-insurances for insured medical services. The bill will limit the imposition of co-payments and co-insurances for insured medical services to no more than 30 percent of the total cost of medical services per visit.

Here’s how this would apply to you:

Let’s say you get in a car accident and require treatment from a chiropractor. Most people have a co-payment under their health insurance policy for each office visit; let’s just say your co-pay is $20. You go to the chiropractor and in one visit, you get three different kinds of treatment, such as electric stimulation, spinal adjustment and a targeted massage of the problem area. Because your co-pay is $20, that’s what you expect to pay when you leave the office. Pretty simple, right?

What some insurance companies are doing now is charging a co-payment for each procedure during the office visit, so by using the example above, instead of paying one co-pay, you would pay three co-pays per visit, or $60 instead of $20. The end result is patients paying far more than they should for each visit.

Insurance companies are pretty meticulous about chiropractic visits anyhow, so this isn’t designed to crack down on people who just like to go to the chiropractor who may not need it.

This is about abusing the spirit of the co-pay system by exploiting a billing code loophole. House Bill 2261 would close this loophole and help make health care more affordable for patients in need who are already paying for coverage.

House Bills 2261 and 2263 are common sense measures designed to help keep health care costs low and allow people to get the care they deserve.

If you have any ideas for legislation, please feel free to contact at jwhite@pahouse.net. I’m always looking for new ideas to help be a better representative for the people of Pennsylvania!