LEGISLATIVE ADVOCACY

When the point of view of physicians is sought by the Board of Supervisors, state legislature and regulatory bodies, Congress, and in the administrative branches of the local, state, and federal levels of government, SMCMA works with the California Medical Association to ensure that the needs of San Mateo County physicians and their patients are represented. No other organization at the local level provides such comprehensive legislative services on behalf of all physicians.

ECONOMIC ADVOCACY

The San Mateo County Medical Association represents your financial interests to both government and commercial health plans.You deserve to be reimbursed appropriately for the medical services you provide. SMCMA is working hard to make sure that happens.

COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT

SMCMA members and staff work hard to enhance the public image of physicians in our community. The San Mateo County Medical Association is usually the first phone call made by the San Mateo County Times, the Daily Journal, and the San Mateo Daily News when an article about health care is being written.

Has the local newspaper called you with a question regarding a current topic of interest, and you didn’t know how to respond? When you receive those calls, refer the media to SMCMA. It’s easy to do, and at the same time, saves you the anxiety of having to "talk to the press" if you are unfamiliar with the subject.

Physicians practicing in San Mateo County have a strong voice within the California Medical Association and the American Medical Association. Through the San Mateo County Delegation to the CMA, composed of 10 delegates and 10 alternates, the San Mateo County Medical Association shares issues that concern San Mateo County physicians with the CMA House of Delegates for discussion and debate. The CMA House of Delegates is responsible for setting policy for the Association, and the San Mateo County delegation has been very successful in having its recommendations become policy.

SMCMA has a physician representative on the CMA’s Board of Trustees. We also elect a member to the California Delegation to the American Medical Association House of Delegates. These individuals make regular reports on AMA and CMA activities to the SMCMA Board of Directors.

MICRA SAVINGS

In 2006 the average San Mateo County physician saved more than $80,252 in malpractice insurance premiums because CMA and SMCMA actively fought to preserve MICRA legislation. Your savings in 2006 alone were more than enough to pay your CMA and SMCMA membership dues for the next few decades, and you can rest assured that organized medicine is working diligently to keep MICRA intact.

In an ongoing effort to provide you with information to help you manage your practice, the San Mateo County Medical Association participated in the 2007 Bay Area Medical Practice Wage & Salary Survey. The information collected through the survey can assist SMCMA members in establishing competitive levels of compensation and benefits for their medical practice staff.

Member physicians who participated in the survey received complimentary copies of the survey results of not only San Mateo County but also those collected in San Francisco, Santa Cruz, Santa Clara, Monterey, Alameda-Contra Costa, Napa,and Solono counties. Copies of the reports are available to non-participating SMCMA members for $100. Survey results are not available to nonmembers.

SMCMA offers a computerized referral service to the general public and makes hundreds of referrals annually to SMCMA members exclusively on the basis of specialty, geographic location, board certification, languages spoken, etc. This is a free public service. With managed care, provider panels, and group practices, a referral service may be considered by some to be obsolete. Don’t believe it. Membership in the Medical Association still denotes quality to the general public. Patients still want to know, "Is my doctor a member of the San Mateo County Medical Association?"

COMPLIMENTARY LEGAL ADVICE

Has anyone ever offered you free legal advice? Probably not. Through an agreement with Hassard Bonnington, a health care law firm headquartered in San Francisco, the SMCMA has secured legal services relating to the business and practice of medicine that is complimentary to members. Have a quick question that needs answering? Free, confidential legal advice is a phone call away.

SMCMA offers another mechanism by which member physicians can obtain legal information. With the California Medical Association’s California Physician’s Legal Handbook (CPLH), the only comprehensive legal guide written especially for California physicians, the Medical Association is able to answer many of our members’ legal questions.

PHYSICIAN-PATIENT MEDIATION

The SMCMA is able to serve as a mediator between patients and physicians by reviewing patient grievances and attempting to resolve them before they have had time to escalate into reports made to the Medical Board of California and potential lawsuits. This service is offered as part of the SMCMA peer review program. The SMCMA’s Professional Relations Committee also reviews problems arising between physicians. According to most professional liability insurance carriers, a great number of lawsuits are due to poor communication or miscommunication between patients and their physicians. The Professional Relations Committee is quite successful in putting out these small fires before they become uncontrollable.

SMCMA also has a Fee & Insurance Mediation Committee that reviews patient complaints about fees charged by a member, and physician complaints regarding insurance reimbursement issues.

THE BULLETIN

The San Mateo County Medical Association’s monthly magazine, The Bulletin, is a "must-read" for every practicing physician in San Mateo County. The Bulletin contains articles on a wide variety of topics that impact medical practices in California.

SMCMA also produces a monthly newsletter offering up to the moment news and information on legislation, regulations, practice management, and other local, state, and national issues.

SMCMA members can find out what the UCR charges are for their most important procedural codes. After they complete an SMCMA member request form, SMCMA will provide members with average national UCRs for up to 20 CPT codes they have identified. Physicians shouldn’t depend on what their health plans tell them. They can find out how much physicians across the country are really charging for the same procedural codes that they use.

The San Mateo County Medical Association hosts, at no charge, periodic medical practice management seminars to assist physicians and their medical office staff in dealing with employment, claims processing, coding, compliance, and other practice management issues. SMCMA members and their staffs are invited.

SMCMA attempts to keep its members abreast of all issues that will have an impact on the practice of medicine in San Mateo County. SMCMA also will fax the California Medical Association’s Legislative Hotlist on a weekly basis to those member physicians and staff who are interested in health care legislation.

SMCMA has partnered with JP Morgan Chase to offer member practices a discounted credit card processing service that will save your practice money on credit card processing.

By using this service, members of SMCMA will benefit by eliminating resaler’s profits. Now SMCMA is able to pass on these direct rates to members without a mark-up. To see how much you can save, fax a copy of your credit card processing statement to SMCMA (650-312-1664). A line-by-line comparative analysis will be performed and returned to you. The discount applies only to members of the San Mateo County Medical Association.

In an effort to save the time of SMCMA members’ administrative staff in making phone calls to determine the Nation Provider Identification Number–formerly the Unique Physician Identifying Number (UPIN)–of a referring physician, the Medical Association plans in 2007 to create a roster of community physicians–both members and nonmembers–that can be used as a one-stop resource to obtain NPIs and other descriptive information about a physician. Free-of-charge to SMCMA members.

SMCMA is contracted with ProDial Communications, Inc., a brokerage agency for providers of telecommunications products and/or services. ProDial will provide an analysis of your current phone bills and suggest ways in which you can save by changing your service provider. The Medical Association itself has benefitted from this service and expects to save 15% off its local calls alone!

HIPAA COMPLIANCE TOOLKIT

The California Medical Association and the San Mateo County Medical Association have teamed with PrivaPlan—a company that has developed a comprehensive and detailed step-by-step approach to HIPAA compliance, assessment, and custom-ization. The CMA/PrivaPlan ToolKit is designed to provide a complete compliance solution for practicing physicians.

The CD-ROM ToolKit contains many forms and instructions on how to get compliant, access to an excellent listserv, and a complete form policy and procedure manual, all of which are important for physician compliance. The California-specific custom-ization of the ToolKit provides SMCMA members with policies and procedures that are simple and effective. Although the CMA/PrivaPlan ToolKit is not "free," members are eligible for a significant fee discount.

The SMCMA Membership Directory is often heralded as the most important benefit of membership by new members. The directory is the only pictorial, comprehensive directory of physicians in San Mateo County. It features photographs of physician members, their specialties, office practice address(es), and telephone number(s), as well as the medical school and graduation year of the physicians. Each member receives one free copy.

The directory serves a dual role. It provides you with an easy reference to other physicians within the county and has a community relations function as well. Many health services organizations and hospitals purchase the directory.

NORCAL Mutual Insurance Company, the malpractice insurance carrier sponsored by SMCMA, offers a special benefit to members of SMCMA. SMCMA offers professional liability evaluation through its Medical Review and Advisory Committee to policyholders of NORCAL. A panel of physicians evaluates potential cases and advises physicians and NORCAL concerning whether the standards of medical care have been met.

As a member of the San Mateo County Medical Association, you have the opportunity to gather with your colleagues in a more social setting by attending Medical Association-sponsored events. The Annual Meeting of Members takes place in late June and includes a keynote speaker on an interesting topic.Other educational programs are offered throughout the year.

SMCMA sponsors several insurance plans through Marsh Affinity Group, which afford member physicians with specially discounted rates on Workers’ Compensation, health insurance, long-term disability, AD&D, group universal life, dental, long-term care, business overhead, and equipment protection coverage. Marsh Affinity recently introduced a health savings account product available to members as well.

Did you know that physicians are in a high-risk category for being audited by the IRS? TaxResources, Inc., which is endorsed by SMCMA, is a unique prepaid audit defense program composed of highly trained, tax-audit specailists. In addition, TaxResources’ annual membership fee is often tax deductible.

SMCMA’s Web site, (www.smcma.org) provides free linkages to SMCMA members’ Web sites. Now, consumers who access the SMCMA Web site will not only see your picture, find out where your office is located, and where you went to medical school, they’ll be able to learn all about your individual medical practice, simply by clicking a button that will send them to your practice’s Web site!

The San Mateo County Medical Association Political Action Committee (SMPAC) and the California Medical Political Action Committee (CALPAC) evaluate candidates and contribute to those supportive of the policies and positions of organized medicine. The primary goal of these PACs is to gain access to legislative leaders and policy makers for medicine’s message to be heard. Your membership in the Medical Association is your link to SMPAC and CALPAC. All Association members are encouraged to make voluntary contributions to these action committees.

Have a difficult issue you’re unable to resolve? Through your membership in SMCMA, you gain access to a wide range of professional resources. Do you need a "Medicare Signature on File" form? How about a "Confidentiality Agreement" form? Chances are, the SMCMA can help you. The Medical Association maintains samples of all types of forms used in typical medical offices. SMCMA members and their staffs can obtain the sample forms they need from the Medical Association and customize them for their own use. The SMCMA maintains a library of practice management information and standard medical office forms. If we don’t have it, we will use the strong relationships we have developed with other county, state, and national medical associations and health organizations to find the answers you need. A simple phone call to SMCMA can often resolve what originally seemed to be a bothersome problem.

SMCMA can provide mailing labels (for approved purposes) of all members practicing in San Mateo County, in self-adhesive label format, sorted by specialty, zip code, and other parameters that you select. Many physicians new to the community use mailing labels to make practice announcements. Mailing labels are available to members at a very low cost.