AMA President to defend the uninsured

American Medical Association President Nancy Nielson has experience struggling with the cost of healthcare. As a graduate student, she herself had coverage, but not her three children.

Paying for pediatric care on a case-by-case basis, Nielson has made it her goal to make sure no other parent has to experience this.

In Chicago last week, Nielson said she would use all her power and sway with the AMA to “let the nation know that we must cover America’s uninsured.” She will serve as president until June of next year.

Only the second woman president in the AMA’s 161 years, Nielson also has experience in the health insurance field and as a medical educator, making her a well-rounded advocate in the fight for a better health care system.

Experts predict that Nielson will experience less flak than her predecessors - who have long butted heads with the insurance industry - due to her experience in that area.

Nielson said she is in favor of report cards – which tell doctors who wasn’t given assistance – but wants more detail. “Most of the ratings were based on cost, and they were not transparent so physicians could challenge the data.”

She added that including patient names so they could be reached out to would be a good first step.

“Well, who knew … that a girl from a small town in West Virginia would someday be president of the largest physician organization in the world,” Nielson said during her inauguration speech.

“And who would have predicted that all that would happen at a time when there's a wide open presidential election, when health-care costs are out of control, when the number of uninsured is now 47 million?”

PatientAssistance.com proudly supports the actions of the American Medical Association and President Nancy Nielson. For more information on the AMA, please visit their website at http://www.ama-assn.org/