ACEP ID:
- My Account
- My CME
- Sign Out
ACEP ID:
Consolidation and corporate investment in medicine are rapidly changing the health care landscape.
The past two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, in particular, have driven many to question the outsized impact of horizontal consolidation and vertical mergers and acquisitions on emergency physicians and their patients.
Yet there is no question that changes happening today will impact physician lives and livelihoods for years to come.
Through more than 50 years of policies and advocacy, ACEP has fought to protect the autonomy of the emergency physician. But we are hearing from you, our current, former and future members, that ACEP should do more.
More to empower every physician to be able to make the decisions that they believe are in the best interest of their patients and their livelihood. More to uphold employer best practices and level the playing field for physicians who deserve due process, transparency in billing and fair compensation. More to stand up for and fight for what we believe in.
Over the past year and through our new strategic plan, your ACEP leaders have taken several bold steps to show that we hear you and will increase our fight for you.
On March 7, 2023, ACEP sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission in response to their proposed ban on non-compete clauses in employment contracts. We detailed how this unfair, predatory practice affects our members and expressed our support for finalizing their ban. Learn more in our public statement about this response.
On April 6, 2022, the ACEP Board of Directors approved the ACEP Statement on Private Equity and Corporate Investment in Emergency Medicine, reaffirming our core beliefs and emphasizing the physician-patient relationship as the moral center of medicine that can never be compromised.
On March 25,2022, ACEP filed an amicus brief in the AAEMPG v. Envision case, upholding the sanctity of a physician’s duty to patients and the importance of allowing them to practice medicine without undue pressure from outside forces. Through this filing, ACEP is applying its might on behalf of our nearly 40,000 members in legal efforts to assert the physician’s right to autonomy in medical decision-making. EMRA also filed a Declaration of Interest in support of the ACEP position.
Earlier this year, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) reaffirmed its commitment to working closely with the Department of Justice (DOJ) to review and update the agencies’ merger guidance, particularly around vertical consolidation.
When the FTC opened its public comment period, ACEP staff were urged by the FTC to comment on behalf of its members. ACEP gathered more than 100 member stories about the impact of consolidation on their ability to do their jobs.
These stories were combined to illustrate patterns and serve as a backdrop for our recommendations in a formal comment letter sent to the FTC on April 20, 2022 harnessing the clout of ACEP’s voice.
ACEP President Dr. Gillian Schmitz and ACEP Executive Director Sue Sedory also shared a preview of some of the collected stories during the FTC's "Listening Forum on Firsthand Effects of Mergers and Acquisitions: Health Care" on April 14, 2022.
ACEP strongly supports legislation under discussion in Congress that would uphold due process protections for physicians. Specifically, this legislation would enable physicians to avoid a mandatory waiver of due process rights, which many are forced to comply with as a condition of group employment.
ACEP is leading conversations with Congress, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and other agencies to make sure that the federal officials keeping a keen eye on provider and insurer consolidation understand emergency physicians’ concerns about the impact of consolidation on systemic issues and costs, reimbursement, and patient care.
