ACR Fellow Criticizes Proposed Rule’s Impact on Health Care Delivery
In many states, radiologists and other health care practitioners rely on airplanes to reach far-flung, remote corners of the state where residents might not have access to high-quality health care providers and facilities. Now, new federal guidelines could severely encumber these efforts.
ACR Fellow James K. Sexton, M.D., knows the importance aircraft play in many areas of the country. As a radiologist in West Virginia “we simply had to close that distance [with] small turboprop aircraft,” Sexton wrote in an op/ed column in the March 23 edition of the West Virginia Gazette. Sexton, now retired and living in Asheville, N.C., criticized the possible new federal guidelines, maintaining they would “charge our small turboprop planes the same to take off and land as a Boeing 747 jetliner, raising the fees by billions.”
“The new aviation rules represent a serious health concern,” Sexton wrote. “If we are forced to cut back on emergency flights to pick up critically ill patients because of new taxes, those patients aren’t likely to ever see the specialist who could diagnose and treat their disease. Thousands more each year will go without the proper medical care.”
Click here to read Sexton’s complete column.