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This CPPPH newsletter aims to keep readers abreast of current developments and relevant information about physician health and wellbeing in California.
All past issues are available from the CPPPH website: www.CPPPH.org.
Definitions
Wellness activities address quality of life and professional satisfaction for all physicians.
Wellbeing activities focus on an individual physician and provide resources for identifying, evaluating, referring, treating, and monitoring for physicians when addiction, mental health, behavioral issues, and the effects of aging are a concern.
Confidential Assistance Over the Phone
The Physicans’ and Dentists’ Confidential Assistance Line is a 24-hour phone service providing completely confidential doctor-to-doctor assistance for physicians experiencing substance use or mental health issues. Call:
Send Us Your Comments
We want to hear from you. Send comments to gjara@cppph.org.
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October 24 Meeting About a New PHP for California
The Medical Board of California has instructed its staff to prepare proposed language for legislation that will allow them to establish a new physician health program that will be different from what was authorized by SB1177 in 2016 and was required to comply with the Uniform Standards created by SB1441. Board members have formed a Task Force to work on proposed legislation and the Board now invites public input. There will be a WebEx meeting on Thursday afternoon, October 24 for comments. In addition, comments can be submitted in writing before November 1, 2024.
Here is the announcement from the MBC:
The Medical Board of California (Board) will hold an interested parties meeting via WebEx on Thursday, October 24, 2024, between 2:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m., to receive comments from the public on draft legislation that would establish authority for the Board to create a physician health and wellness program (PHWP).
An agenda (which will include participation instructions) and draft PHWP legislation will be published on the Board’s website and distributed no later than 10 days prior to the meeting. To receive the agenda, please subscribe to the “Board and Committee Meetings” email alert.
Verbal and written comments received will be considered by a task force of Board members and made available to all Board members prior to the full Board’s consideration of draft legislation at the Board’s Quarterly Meeting on November 21-22, 2024.
If any interested party has comments on this matter, please submit them in writing to PHWP.comments@mbc.ca.gov no later than Friday, November 1, 2024.
Here are instructions about participating in the October 24th meeting (or any MBC meeting):
Who Runs the Recovery Programs for Eight Health Care Professions in California?
California’s Department of Consumer Affairs (DCA), the parent agency over all of California’s licensing boards for the health care professions, issued, on August 28th, a request for a proposal to run the recovery programs (diversion programs) for 8 of the health profession licensing boards — all but the Medical Board of California. The programs for all 8 of those boards are currently run by Maximus, a national for-profit company that has “partnered with federal, state, and local governments for over 45 years supporting communities to have access to critical health and human service programs.”
From the RFP: “This Request for Proposal (RFP) is to select a Contractor who shall work cooperatively with the California Department of Consumer Affairs (DCA) and its participating regulatory entities to implement and administer a statewide program covering substance abuse and mental illness. The DCA Recovery Program is a statewide, comprehensive, substance abuse and/or mental illness program, involving treatment, rehabilitation, monitoring, compliance referrals and recovery for health care professionals.”
From the RFP: These are the 8 Boards/professions and the number of participants in each program. (Note that the Medical Board of California is not among them.)
- Board of Registered Nursing (BRN has 215 participants* in Recovery Program)
- Dental Board of California (DBC has 0 participants* in Recovery Program)
- California State Board of Pharmacy (BOP has 27 participants* in Recovery Program)
- Physical Therapy Board of California (PTBC has 10 participants* in Recovery Program)
- Physician Assistant Board (PAB has 5 participants* in Recovery Program)
- Veterinary Medical Board (VMB has 1 participants* in Recovery Program)
- Osteopathic Medical Board of California (OMBC has 11 participants* in Recovery Program)
- Dental Hygiene Board of California (DHBC has 4 participant* in Recovery Program)
*Participant numbers are estimates and may fluctuate throughout the years.
Six weeks were allowed for submission of proposals; they were due October 9. No information about how many proposals were received or the contents of the proposals is made available by DCA, but, according to DCA, a Public Records Request can be submitted to see that information. The proposals will be reviewed and scored by the DCA, and the agency will post its intent to award the contract to the winning proposal. No date is given for that announcement, but DCA reported that the contract awarded will become effective on January 1, 2025.
Confidentiality and Psychological Safety
In the JAMA VIEWPOINT article, How Should Organizations Be Held Accountable for Clinician Well-Being?, the subject matter is about wellness and burnout, not about alcohol/drug use, addiction, mental health diagnoses, behavioral issues, cognitive decline, but the authors discuss the background principles that have an indirect but helpful relation to how wellbeing committees think about the questions of who should be informed of what and of how much. The article discusses principles of why and how “confidentiality” protects patients.
The authors are Jonathan Ripp, MD, MPH, Chief Wellness Officer at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York and Tait Shanafelt, MD, Chief Wellness Officer, Stanford Medicine. They talk about “psychological safety” and give this definition: “… feeling safe to raise concerns without negative repercussions and avoiding pressure to conceal problems.” The full article was published online August 8, 2024.
Letters to the Editor
We are interested in hearing from our readers. Would you oblige? Would you send a message to let CPPPH know your thoughts and viewpoint? Address your email to gjara@cppph.org. Letters to the Editor may spark a new section of future newsletters.
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