2020 Legislative Campaign

TAKE ACTION FOR ACUPUNCTURE

Without inclusion of language that precisely defines the dry needling procedure in statute, FSOMA must oppose HB 467 and the current amended version of SB 792. 

Please contact your local Florida House Representative and Senator to voice your concern over absence of a dry needling definition in HB 467 and the vague and expansive definition for dry needling in SB 792.  Create your own message or use the suggested language in the link. They are Word documents so you can edit them to personalize them.

Example Letters

2020 Dry Needling Legislation Talking Points – Acupuncturists / Interns

  • Talking point for Senate Bill 792: physical therapists have failed to provide a clear and concise definition for dry needling.
  • Physical therapists receive no specific education training in the safe and effective use of acupuncture needles in their entry level program 
  • Physical therapists receive no clinical supervision for performing dry needling trigger point acupuncture before needling patients  
  • And training over a couple of weekends at a Holiday inn is no substitute for clinical supervisor training in an academic setting 
  • Talking point for house bill 467: this bill fails to provide any definition or minimum standards of training for dry needling... Simply empowers the board of physical therapy to do whatever it wants regarding expansion of the PT scope of practice to include invasive medical procedures 
  • It's reckless and dangerous to allow industry regulators to write their own rules for practice scope expansion 

 

Download your 2020 How To Kit - Legislative Meeting Process
Download your Lobbying Worksheet
Click on this link to find your State Senator & State Representative. 
Here are talking points for your next meeting

  • E-mail them today to make an appointment. Do as soon as possible - committee weeks start this year in September.
  • During the committee weeks especially in October and November and during the Legislative session you will need to travel to Tallahassee (come to Acupuncture Education Day Feb 4) OR visit a staffer in the local office.  
  • Take a patient with you!
  • Tell them about yourself and your practice. There is power in your story (and your patient's!)

 

Opioid Addiction Legislative Campaign

If you have met before with your legislator, you can add some of these talking points to your meeting.

Print These and Give Them to Your Legislator

Acupuncture for Chronic Pain: Update of an Individual Patient Data Meta-Analysis 
The Journal of Pain, Vol 19, No 5 (May), 2018: pp 455-474  

“Acupuncture is effective for the treatment of chronic musculoskeletal, headache, and osteoarthritis pain. Treatment effects of acupuncture persist over time and cannot be explained solely in terms of placebo effects. Referral for a course of acupuncture treatment is a reasonable option for a patient with chronic pain.”  Acupuncture effective for chronic pain beyond placebo with sustained benefit at one year reduced by 15%. NO OPIOID DOES THAT.

Attorneys General to Insurers: Cover Acupuncture

“The undersigned State Attorneys General are sending you this letter to urge America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) to take proactive steps to encourage your members to review their payment and coverage policies and revise them, as necessary and appropriate, to encourage healthcare providers to prioritize non-opioid pain management options over opioid prescriptions for the treatment of chronic, non-cancer pain…… When patients seek treatment for any of the myriad conditions that cause chronic pain, doctors should be encouraged to explore and prescribe effective non-opioid alternatives, ranging from non-opioid medications (such as NSAIDs) to physical therapy, acupuncture, massage, and chiropractic care.”

HB 1073: Health Care Practitioner Prescribing Practices
By Representative Plasencia
https://m.flsenate.gov/Bill/1073/2019
Health Care Practitioner Prescribing Practices; Requires health care practitioners to refer or prescribe nonpharmaceutical interventional therapies for chronic nonmalignant pain or acute pain before prescribing opioid; requires licensed massage therapist to maintain & submit certain patient records to practitioner; requires insurance to cover specified number of therapies.

SB 1360: Alternative Treatments to Controlled Substances
By Senator Gruters
http://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2019/01360 
Alternative Treatments to Controlled Substances; Requiring a practitioner who prescribes controlled substances to recommend specified alternative treatments for chronic nonmalignant pain before prescribing a controlled substance to a patient; requiring certain insurance policies to provide coverage for a minimum number of visits to alternative treatment providers for the treatment of chronic nonmalignant pain under certain conditions, etc.

Other Possible Handouts

Power Point on Opioids and Acupuncture

Acupuncture for Chronic Pain in the Vermont Medicaid Population
 
Acupuncture's Role in Solving the Opioid Epidemic from the ASA
 

Acupuncture and Opioid Addiction

Joint Commission Pain Management Standards

Other Resources to Share

YouTube Video

Acupuncture Outperforms Morphine for Moderate to Severe Pain

NBC Nightly News – Pain Relief Without Pills

Emergency Room Patients are Choosing Acupuncture Instead of Painkillers

Acupuncture Research

Dry Needling 
Administrative Law Judge Lawrence P. Stevenson ruled that  “dry needling is acupuncture as defined in” state law, which “does not allow PTs to practice dry needling in Florida.”  We would like to be involved in any discussion of the training needed for the practice of acupuncture in Florida.
 
Additional Dry Needling Information
Interactive Map About Dry Needling Adverse Events (share this link)