Advocacy Update: President Signs Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
On March 23, 2010, President Obama signed into law a comprehensive health care reform bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA; P.L. 111-148). PPACA includes numerous provisions intended to increase the primary care and public health workforce, promote preventive services, and strengthen quality measurement, among other things. It amends and expands many of the existing health workforce programs authorized under Title VII (health professions) and Title VIII (nursing) of the Public Health Service Act (PHSA); creates a Public Health Services Track to train health care professionals emphasizing team-based service, public health, epidemiology, and emergency preparedness and response; and makes a number of changes to the Medicare graduate medical education (GME) payments to teaching hospitals, in part to encourage the training of more primary care physicians. The new law also establishes a national commission to study projected health workforce needs.
For more information on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, please utilize the resources below:
View a set of frequently-asked-questions that cover the legislation and health care reform in general.
View a summary of the key elements of the legislation.
View a chart that compares the new legislation to ACP policy , and to each of the previous versions of congressional legislation.