Personal Responsibility: The Key to O&P’s Future
By Walter Gorski, AOPA Government Affairs Department

Each year, the AOPA National Assembly provides all of us the opportunity to see what the future holds for O&P. On display is cutting-edge technology that will benefit millions and the talented O&P professionals who will improve the lives of individuals in need of these services in the coming years.  

But what is really on display at every national O&P meeting is the “people power” behind the field. Whether it is the work of an individual or a team, it is these efforts that move this field forward on every important front.

In light of this, I had conversations with several prominent people in the field, in which I asked them to consider what the future holds and the real and perceived challenges we collectively face.

I spoke with an AOPA lifetime achievement award winner (Sam Hamontree, CP), an incoming member of AOPA Board of Directors (Anita Liberman-Lampear, MA), a solo practitioner who vows not to leave the future to chance without a fight (Harry Layton, CPO), and an educator and researcher at Northwestern University (Stefania Fatone, PhD, BPO-Hons.).

The following is the roundtable discussion held by this group.

AOPA: What do you view as the greatest threat to the O&P profession?

Hamontree: To me, without a doubt, the biggest threat facing the field and the patients we serve is the financial one. It is a combination of excessive regulation of procedure codes that inhibits new technology making its way to the market and inadequate reimbursement for our services. Everything breaks down from there.

Liberman-Lampear: Reimbursement rates and the perception of how the insurance company views our services for the patients [is at the core of the problem]. The patient is suffering. Insurers don’t understand the value of what we provide. They claim that there is not enough value. To them, it is a piece of plastic or just a device.

I call [changing this perception] a challenge, not so much a threat, but something that we must focus our attention on.

Fatone: Dudley Childress, whom I have the pleasure of working with, put it best when he described O&P as an immature science. I think that as a profession we are under enormous pressure to develop the science of O&P and substantiate why we do things the way we do and what effect they have on the patient.

I don’t think that the task is insurmountable, but I think we need to be realistic about how quickly we can accomplish this. We need to be sure that our science is sound and based on high-quality research.

Layton: While folks in this field are passionate, there seem to be so many challenges that I think many of us just don’t know where to start. That can lead to inaction, which, in my opinion, is our biggest threat. We all need to get involved, not tomorrow but today.

AOPA: How do you think the field is perceived and how much work still needs to be done?

Hamontree: We as a field have not done a good job of selling ourselves to the world. While the perception of the field is changing in a positive manner, we have not done the job of selling ourselves and what we do for people in order to reach an appropriate level of recognition. We have said the words a lot of times but we haven’t focused on this issue like we should have. We just do not sell the public on the value we bring to human beings.

To a certain extent, the war and news stories coming out of Walter Reed have increased awareness of O&P but more needs to be done. Had we spent more time on this issue in the past, the U.S. would know what we are about.

Liberman-Lampear: We are better perceived today than we were 10 years ago. We are more aligned with other allied health fields in the eye of the physician, but clearly more work needs to be done.

AOPA: Do you think practitioners should make time to participate in the political process?

Hamontree: I think they have to. Who else is looking out for your livelihood over the long haul? I believe that all too often, practitioners look to someone else, or look to their employer. Every practitioner needs to get involved. And any one person can make a difference if they reach the right person.

Fatone: I think that part of being a professional is to contribute to your profession through service, whether it be involvement in the political process, education, mentoring or research, among other things. Each and every one of us in the O&P field needs to take responsibility for how our field develops and become actively involved in the process.

Liberman-Lampear: We are our own best advocates but, at the same time, we are our worst enemy. We are a small field which requires practitioners to go the extra mile. If we don’t tell our story, who will?
It is in our best interests if practitioners make a concerted effort to get involved. I definitely believe even one person can make a difference.

AOPA: What advice would you give to young practitioners entering the field today?

Fatone: There are enormous contributions to be made to the development of the field. Young O&P professionals should approach each and every task with an inquiring mind and critically analyze all the information available to them.

Take every opportunity to interact and communicate with professional peers so as to establish a mutually respectful relationship. Take responsibility for how the field continues to develop by contributing service to professional activities.

Liberman-Lampear: The advice that I give all young people getting in the field is to get involved in the business and the politics of the field. Express your views and learn to make a difference in O&P and how it is perceived by our patients and our payers and our referring sources. 

Hamontree: Individual practitioners have to assume responsibility for themselves. If they want to move forward, they must make themselves valuable to their employer and their field. I think everyone should give something back to the profession that has given so much to them. They should take any opportunity to get involved in the field, whether at the national or state associations. Our future, the future of the profession and the future of what we can bring to our patients is at stake.

Correction: In the September 2006 "From the Hill", the list of PAC events attendees omitted Tom Watson, CP, of Tom Watson's Prosthetic & Orthotic Lab Inc. of Owensboro, Ky. The O&P Almanac regrets the error

Walter Gorski is the director of legislative and regulatory affairs for the American Orthotic & Prosthetic Association (AOPA).

Through government relations efforts, AOPA works to influence policies affecting the future of the O&P profession.

Questions? Call (571) 431-0876 or visit www.AOPAnet.org.