02/07/05

To: Members of the Minnesota Athletic Trainers Association (MATA)

From: Paul Bruning, President MATA

This past year was an interesting year for the profession of Athletic Training. There were some set backs in the advancement of the profession, such as the decision by CMS regarding “incident to” charges; but there were also very positive steps made. The continued advancement of the education of athletic trainers as well as a very promising legal decision, made here in Minnesota, are reasons for optimism. This letter is being sent to every member of the MATA to inform him or her of the Practice Act Task Forces work. This task force was started as the CMS task force but we have changed the name and focus to the Practice Act Task Force. This group has met and had several conference calls to help guide the direction and advancement of the profession of athletic training within Minnesota.

Included with this letter are a few documents for your use to help you in your personal growth as an athletic training professional and help to strengthen your personal athletic training practice. If you have any questions feel free to contact the Practice Act Task Force. You can do this by going to the MATA web site www.mnata.com and going to the contact us site then scrolling down to the Practice Act Task Force and clicking on email the committee.

The main key messages the task force would like to send are as follows:

There is legislative intent to support all of these key messages within our athletic training act. As found in these enclosed documents there is now Legal Precedent to support all of these key messages. This is an important advancement for the profession of athletic training. Remember that the CMS decision only affects the billing of patients that receive Medicare not the billing of other insured patients using standard physical medicine codes. The vast majority of patients still have access to the quality care that athletic trainers can provide.

There is educational information being posted to the web site to remind all athletic trainers of the rigorous educational standards that are in place for athletic training education. The development of athletic training education has followed a very similar model as the educational development of most other medical professions including: MD, PA, DC, RN and PT. Athletic Training is a relatively young profession and is continuing to grow and develop. Athletic Trainers are highly educated experts in their field. This educational newsletter shows the development of athletic training education and can be used as a tool to present this information to interested parties.

Lastly, included with this mailing are four items. One is a new MATA brochure. If you have need for additional copies please contact an Executive Committee member or one of the PR committee members. Second, is a flier about our annual state meeting. This is going to be an outstanding program and I encourage everyone to try and make this program if possible. I hope to see many of you there. Third, we will be having a web cast discussion of these issues in real time with a town hall format. If you have access to a computer log in and watch and ask questions. See the included flier for time and how to log on. Please try and make the time to log in and be an active part of this web cast town hall meeting. Fourth is a legal summary, by the MATA attorneys, in regards to a legal precedent from a court case involving athletic training here in Minnesota. All of these will be discussed on the web cast.

I would personally like to thank each of the members of the Practice Act Task Force for their time and efforts over the past several months. It is truly appreciated by me and I am sure I can speak for the association that the members are thankful for what they have done and will do for the profession. So special thanks to Amy Hamilton, Mike Hudson, Pat Sexton, Jeff Carlson, Mike Doyle, Scott Kulstad, Marielle Gatenby and Dean Wennerberg.