AMA Interim Meeting Recap

The American Medical Association’s top advocacy priorities focus on promoting thriving physician practices, ensuring access to care for patients, removing administrative burdens and minimizing care delays, fighting scope creep that threatens patient safety, making technology work for physicians, and advancing physician wellness.

To fix our unsustainable Medicare payment system, AMA advocates enacting annual permanent inflation-based updates tied to the Medicare Economic Index, reforming budget neutrality and the Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS), and ensuring a strong Alternative Payment Model (APM) program. The "One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act" (OBBBA, Public Law 119-21) includes a 2.5% positive update for 2026. This combines with the previously enacted 0.75% for qualifying APMs and 0.25% for others and a new “Efficiency Adjustment” and Site of Service Payment Differential introduced by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) with impacts that vary by specialty.

AMA continues to strongly oppose policies that undermine patient access to Medicaid and CHIP coverage or impede adequate funding for the safety net. While OBBBA does not impose per capita caps, decrease Federal Medical Assistance Percentage (FMAP) rates, or eliminate the Medicaid expansion eligibility pathway, the Congressional Budget Office projects that 7.5 million people will lose Medicaid coverage due to new administrative burdens, cost-shifting to states, and other policies. Marketplace changes are anticipated to exacerbate coverage losses.

To reform prior authorization, AMA secured key regulatory changes for government-regulated health plans and continues to monitor and push for implementation and codification of these changes to ensure that the goals come to fruition. AMA advocacy favorably influenced rules recommended for ERISA plans. An AMA-led Federation letter urges Congressional leaders to promptly schedule a vote on the widely supported bipartisan “Improving Seniors’ Timely Access to Care Act;” bill leaders include Reps. Mike Kelly and John Joyce of Pennsylvania; cosponsors include 13 of Pennsylvania’s federal legislators. AMA supports state advocacy – where more than 20 prior authorization bills have been enacted in 2025 – and has worked with the national policy-forming body NCOIL as it developed its model bill. AMA expressed concerns to CMS regarding its WISeR model and continues to meet with the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) about ways to improve the model.

AMA strongly supports physician-led, team-based care where all members of the team use their unique knowledge and valuable contributions to improve patient outcomes. The AMA Scope of Practice Partnership (SOPP) – a coalition of 113 national, state and specialty medical and osteopathic associations – has been instrumental in defeating scope expansion bills. Collaborative work led to defeat of 95+ bills this year. So far in 2025, the SOPP Steering Committee has awarded over 19 grants to SOPP members, including PAMED – with essential tools and over $5 million in grants to its members to fund advocacy campaigns since 2007. An AMA-led Federation letter to Congress opposes a federal bill that would inappropriately expand pharmacists’ scope of practice.

AMA launched its new Center for Digital Health and AI, focused on policy and regulatory leadership, clinical workflow integration, education and training, and collaboration. AMA has robust policy on AI development, deployment, and use that guides the organization’s engagement with the administration, Congress, and industry stakeholders. Principles emphasize that healthcare AI should be ethical, equitable, responsible, and transparent. AMA advocates for passage of legislation to extend flexibilities that have significantly improved access to virtual care for patients in rural and underserved areas. Successful AMA advocacy helped to advance telehealth regulatory flexibilities.

AMA’s sustained advocacy, working with the Federation and the Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes’ Foundation, has been instrumental to 40 state medical boards, including in Pennsylvania, and more than 1,800 health systems, hospitals, medical centers, clinics and other care facilities removing intrusive mental health questions and stigmatizing language from their licensing and credentialing applications.

At the November meeting, the AMA Board met with Abe Sutton, JD, Director of CMMI to discuss the Center’s new initiatives; and Calley Means, MBA, an advisor to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, about forthcoming nutrition guidelines.

AMA is more actively communicating on public health issues. In addition, its new Center for Optimal Health Outcomes is awarding a total of $1 million in micro grants to support 20 physician-led initiatives aimed at improving health outcomes in their communities.