Amy’s Advocacy Update

As we move into the summer, Congress is busy working on spending bills that fund agencies and programs that are critical to women’s heart health and access to care, such as the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, heart disease and stroke prevention efforts, implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), and more. WomenHeart is urging Congress to adequately fund these priorities.

We are also proactively advancing an agenda that raises awareness of the need for more women to participate in clinical trials and to access cardiac rehab. In May, dozens of WomenHeart champions and National Hospital Alliance members visited Capitol Hill to share those priorities with their members of Congress. Then, as members of the Coalition for Women’s Health Equity, we participated in the Women’s Health Empowerment Summit in Washington, DC, which included a panel discussion of the past, present and future of women in clinical trials.

And earlier this year, Congress passed legislation that would allow physician assistants, nurse practitioners, and clinical nurse specialists to supervise cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation on a day-to-day basis under Medicare. While this provision doesn’t go into effect until 2024, the goal is to improve access to this critical service.