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Despite Successes, Addiction Treatment Programs for Families Struggle to Stay Open

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Christina Saint Louis
Wed, 13 Sep 2023 10:00:00 +0000

MORA, Minn. — Two playgrounds border the Recovering Hope Treatment Center for addiction that sits at the end of a gravel road in eastern Minnesota’s rural Kanabec County. A meeting room inside is furnished with rocking chairs and baby walkers. And there are strollers in the halls.

Recovering Hope is one of only five providers in the state that offer family-based residential treatment, allowing women to enter the program while pregnant or to bring one of their children younger than 5 with them for the duration of their stay. Men can receive outpatient treatment but aren’t permitted in the residential program.

It’s the only such residential program located in a rural Minnesota county and is licensed for 108 beds. It has a waitlist that can span from two to six weeks, depending on whether a woman plans to enter treatment alone or with her child.

“If you don’t provide family services, the parents run the risk of losing their kids,” said Ashley Snyder, a licensed drug and alcohol counselor at Recovering Hope.

Family-based residential treatment has been recognized by behavioral health professionals as having better outcomes for women and their children. But such programs often struggle to stay afloat because of staffing shortages and volatile funding. And because of that complexity, families in rural areas are less likely to find such a residential treatment program in their communities.

Meanwhile, maternal opioid-related diagnoses have increased nationwide. From 2010 to 2017, the rates of women with those diagnoses at delivery increased by 131% and babies born with withdrawal symptoms increased by 82%, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The increases disproportionately affected rural areas. At Recovering Hope, opioids are among the top substances, along with alcohol and meth, that lead women to seek treatment.

“There are too few programs,” said Margaret Ratcliff, an executive vice president at Volunteers of America, which co-published a national directory of family-based residential treatment programs with Wilder Research in 2019. At that time, the directory listed 362 family-based residential treatment programs nationwide, a number that experts, including Ratcliff, say is continually in flux.

Many of the programs offer some variation of the model in place at Recovering Hope, though the maximum age of children varies.

From its own affiliations with such programs, Ratcliff said, Volunteers of America has seen that “the problem is that Medicaid does not cover the cost of a comprehensive program, and grants come and go.”

Even at Recovering Hope, which has operated since 2016 and is expanding its outpatient treatment to include teenagers and building sober houses, smaller insurance reimbursements have affected care. Women in the center’s residential program previously spent up to an average of 40 days in high-intensity care at the beginning of their treatment, but that timespan is now closer to 30 days to contain costs due to those low reimbursement rates. Most of the women in the residential treatment program are covered by Medicaid.

High-intensity care accounts for a third of the center’s treatment plan. On average, women’s full residential treatment at Recovering Hope lasts 90 to 120 days. During that time, women can enroll their children in on-site day care and bring them along to programming. The kids receive regular visits from a Head Start educator and a psychologist.

Researchers say that family-based residential treatment can improve women’s pregnancy outcomes by keeping them away from drug use during their pregnancy and strengthening their bond with their children. Experts also say the programs increase the likelihood that women will complete treatment.

Beyond the financial hurdles involved in running family treatment programs, managers face logistical constraints. Providing schooling is one of the challenges that come with operating a family-based treatment center, Snyder said. For example, she said, part of the reason the facility allows only for children younger than 5 is to not affect local school enrollment.

“The school district kind of said, ‘Hey, if you put kids in our school district, and then take them out, that’s not great for us,’” she said. “‘We don’t have enough teachers. So, if you put three kids in the classroom that’s already at max, we would technically need to hire another teacher, but they’re only here for three months.’”

In addition to the age restriction, Recovering Hope limits the women to bringing one child each.

For Lisa Thompson, who was in residential treatment there from January to April, that limit led her to leave both of her kids with their grandmother rather than split them up.

“First getting there, it was really hard seeing women with their children and not having mine,” Thompson, 40, said. “But after being there, and becoming more comfortable, it was just nice being able to have that connection with other mothers there.”

For Gabriela Cajucom, Recovering Hope’s ability to accommodate one child helped her reunite with her oldest son one month into her inpatient program, which ran from November to February. Child Protective Services had originally placed him with his grandmother but allowed him to live with Cajucom as she completed her treatment.

“He even just ran up to one of the old day care ladies, like totally remembered her and gave her a hug,” said Cajucom, 26, who since has moved to outpatient treatment and is set to graduate in October. “It was a very good community feeling.”

CPS granted her custody of her son in May.

But despite success stories from Recovering Hope and other programs, some states have found it difficult to keep such facilities running.

In neighboring North Dakota, the state Department of Health and Human Services has been trying to establish a family-based residential treatment option like Recovering Hope since 2020. The state has been without one since April 2019, when its lone provider shut down.

The department has issued three requests for proposals seeking providers to offer a treatment model that allows children to live with a parent undergoing residential treatment but didn’t receive any responses.

“It was during covid, the height of covid, and programs were really trying to maintain what they had, or they were already decreasing some of their services due to capacity or changing their practices to go to telehealth,” said Lacresha Graham, the department’s manager of addiction treatment and recovery program and policy. “I guess that caused providers to not want to look at expanding.”

In requesting proposals, the state outlined requirements, such as: The provider must have the residential capacity to serve at least 10 women and their children at once and situate the facility in a community with a neonatal intensive care unit.

Though the expectation is that providers already have experience in adult addiction treatment, they also must change their care model to accommodate both the physical and health needs of mothers and children, Graham said.

In May, Republican Gov. Doug Burgum approved a one-time $1 million allocation in the state Health and Human Services 2023-25 budget to fund family-based residential treatment, which can be used to cover construction and renovation costs. As a result, the department is working to issue another request for proposals to find a provider that offers services like those at Recovering Hope.

“Ideally, there would be multiple across the state so there’d be better access to locations for women that would need it,” Graham said. “Our priority is getting one up and running and see where we can go from there.”

——————————
By: Christina Saint Louis
Title: Despite Successes, Addiction Treatment Programs for Families Struggle to Stay Open
Sourced From: kffhealthnews.org/news/article/family-addiction-treatment-centers-scarce-rural-minnesota-north-dakota/
Published Date: Wed, 13 Sep 2023 10:00:00 +0000

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Dual Threats From Trump and GOP Imperil Nursing Homes and Their Foreign-Born Workers

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kffhealthnews.org – Jordan Rau, KFF Health News – 2025-06-26 04:00:00


In Alexandria, Virginia, Rev. Donald Goodness, 92, is cared for by many foreign-born nurses like Jackline Conteh from Sierra Leone, who vigilantly manages his celiac disease needs. The long-term care industry relies heavily on immigrants, with 28% of direct care workers being foreign-born. However, President Trump’s 2024 immigration crackdown, including rescinded protections and revoked work permits for refugees, threatens staffing levels. Coupled with proposed Medicaid spending cuts, nursing homes face worsening shortages and quality challenges. Many immigrant caregivers fear deportation, risking a crisis in elder care as demand rises with America’s aging population.


In a top-rated nursing home in Alexandria, Virginia, the Rev. Donald Goodness is cared for by nurses and aides from various parts of Africa. One of them, Jackline Conteh, a naturalized citizen and nurse assistant from Sierra Leone, bathes and helps dress him most days and vigilantly intercepts any meal headed his way that contains gluten, as Goodness has celiac disease.

“We are full of people who come from other countries,” Goodness, 92, said about Goodwin House Alexandria’s staff. Without them, the retired Episcopal priest said, “I would be, and my building would be, desolate.”

The long-term health care industry is facing a double whammy from President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigrants and the GOP’s proposals to reduce Medicaid spending. The industry is highly dependent on foreign workers: More than 800,000 immigrants and naturalized citizens comprise 28% of direct care employees at home care agencies, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and other long-term care companies.

But in January, the Trump administration rescinded former President Joe Biden’s 2021 policy that protected health care facilities from Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids. The administration’s broad immigration crackdown threatens to drastically reduce the number of current and future workers for the industry. “People may be here on a green card, and they are afraid ICE is going to show up,” said Katie Smith Sloan, president of LeadingAge, an association of nonprofits that care for older adults.

Existing staffing shortages and quality-of-care problems would be compounded by other policies pushed by Trump and the Republican-led Congress, according to nursing home officials, resident advocates, and academic experts. Federal spending cuts under negotiation may strip nursing homes of some of their largest revenue sources by limiting ways states leverage Medicaid money and making it harder for new nursing home residents to retroactively qualify for Medicaid. Care for 6 in 10 residents is paid for by Medicaid, the state-federal health program for poor or disabled Americans.

“We are facing the collision of two policies here that could further erode staffing in nursing homes and present health outcome challenges,” said Eric Roberts, an associate professor of internal medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.

The industry hasn’t recovered from covid-19, which killed more than 200,000 long-term care facility residents and workers and led to massive staff attrition and turnover. Nursing homes have struggled to replace licensed nurses, who can find better-paying jobs at hospitals and doctors’ offices, as well as nursing assistants, who can earn more working at big-box stores or fast-food joints. Quality issues that preceded the pandemic have expanded: The percentage of nursing homes that federal health inspectors cited for putting residents in jeopardy of immediate harm or death has risen alarmingly from 17% in 2015 to 28% in 2024.

In addition to seeking to reduce Medicaid spending, congressional Republicans have proposed shelving the biggest nursing home reform in decades: a Biden-era rule mandating minimum staffing levels that would require most of the nation’s nearly 15,000 nursing homes to hire more workers.

The long-term care industry expects demand for direct care workers to burgeon with an influx of aging baby boomers needing professional care. The Census Bureau has projected the number of people 65 and older would grow from 63 million this year to 82 million in 2050.

In an email, Vianca Rodriguez Feliciano, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services, said the agency “is committed to supporting a strong, stable long-term care workforce” and “continues to work with states and providers to ensure quality care for older adults and individuals with disabilities.” In a separate email, Tricia McLaughlin, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, said foreigners wanting to work as caregivers “need to do that by coming here the legal way” but did not address the effect on the long-term care workforce of deportations of classes of authorized immigrants.

Goodwin Living, a faith-based nonprofit, runs three retirement communities in northern Virginia for people who live independently, need a little assistance each day, have memory issues, or require the availability of around-the-clock nurses. It also operates a retirement community in Washington, D.C. Medicare rates Goodwin House Alexandria as one of the best-staffed nursing homes in the country. Forty percent of the organization’s 1,450 employees are foreign-born and are either seeking citizenship or are already naturalized, according to Lindsay Hutter, a Goodwin spokesperson.

“As an employer, we see they stay on with us, they have longer tenure, they are more committed to the organization,” said Rob Liebreich, Goodwin’s president and CEO.

Jackline Conteh spent much of her youth shuttling between Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Ghana to avoid wars and tribal conflicts. Her mother was killed by a stray bullet in her home country of Liberia, Conteh said. “She was sitting outside,” Conteh, 56, recalled in an interview.

Conteh was working as a nurse in a hospital in Sierra Leone in 2009 when she learned of a lottery for visas to come to the United States. She won, though she couldn’t afford to bring her husband and two children along at the time. After she got a nursing assistant certification, Goodwin hired her in 2012.

Conteh said taking care of elders is embedded in the culture of African families. When she was 9, she helped feed and dress her grandmother, a job that rotated among her and her sisters. She washed her father when he was dying of prostate cancer. Her husband joined her in the United States in 2017; she cares for him because he has heart failure.

“Nearly every one of us from Africa, we know how to care for older adults,” she said.

Her daughter is now in the United States, while her son is still in Africa. Conteh said she sends money to him, her mother-in-law, and one of her sisters.

In the nursing home where Goodness and 89 other residents live, Conteh helps with daily tasks like dressing and eating, checks residents’ skin for signs of swelling or sores, and tries to help them avoid falling or getting disoriented. Of 102 employees in the building, broken up into eight residential wings called “small houses” and a wing for memory care, at least 72 were born abroad, Hutter said.

Donald Goodness grew up in Rochester, New York, and spent 25 years as rector of The Church of the Ascension in New York City, retiring in 1997. He and his late wife moved to Alexandria to be closer to their daughter, and in 2011 they moved into independent living at the Goodwin House. In 2023 he moved into one of the skilled nursing small houses, where Conteh started caring for him.

“I have a bad leg and I can’t stand on it very much, or I’d fall over,” he said. “She’s in there at 7:30 in the morning, and she helps me bathe.” Goodness said Conteh is exacting about cleanliness and will tell the housekeepers if his room is not kept properly.

Conteh said Goodness was withdrawn when he first arrived. “He don’t want to come out, he want to eat in his room,” she said. “He don’t want to be with the other people in the dining room, so I start making friends with him.”

She showed him a photo of Sierra Leone on her phone and told him of the weather there. He told her about his work at the church and how his wife did laundry for the choir. The breakthrough, she said, came one day when he agreed to lunch with her in the dining room. Long out of his shell, Goodness now sits on the community’s resident council and enjoys distributing the mail to other residents on his floor.

“The people that work in my building become so important to us,” Goodness said.

While Trump’s 2024 election campaign focused on foreigners here without authorization, his administration has broadened to target those legally here, including refugees who fled countries beset by wars or natural disasters. This month, the Department of Homeland Security revoked the work permits for migrants and refugees from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela who arrived under a Biden-era program.

“I’ve just spent my morning firing good, honest people because the federal government told us that we had to,” Rachel Blumberg, president of the Toby & Leon Cooperman Sinai Residences of Boca Raton, a Florida retirement community, said in a video posted on LinkedIn. “I am so sick of people saying that we are deporting people because they are criminals. Let me tell you, they are not all criminals.”

At Goodwin House, Conteh is fearful for her fellow immigrants. Foreign workers at Goodwin rarely talk about their backgrounds. “They’re scared,” she said. “Nobody trusts anybody.” Her neighbors in her apartment complex fled the U.S. in December and returned to Sierra Leone after Trump won the election, leaving their children with relatives.

“If all these people leave the United States, they go back to Africa or to their various countries, what will become of our residents?” Conteh asked. “What will become of our old people that we’re taking care of?”

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free Morning Briefing.

This article first appeared on KFF Health News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

The post Dual Threats From Trump and GOP Imperil Nursing Homes and Their Foreign-Born Workers appeared first on kffhealthnews.org



Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

This content primarily highlights concerns about the impact of restrictive immigration policies and Medicaid spending cuts proposed by the Trump administration and Republican lawmakers on the long-term care industry. It emphasizes the importance of immigrant workers in healthcare, the challenges that staffing shortages pose to patient care, and the potential negative effects of GOP policy proposals. The tone is critical of these policies while sympathetic toward immigrant workers and advocates for maintaining or increasing government support for healthcare funding. The framing aligns with a center-left perspective, focusing on social welfare, immigrant rights, and concern about the consequences of conservative economic and immigration policies without descending into partisan rhetoric.

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Kaiser Health News

California’s Much-Touted IVF Law May Be Delayed Until 2026, Leaving Many in the Lurch

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kffhealthnews.org – Sarah Kwon – 2025-06-25 04:00:00


California lawmakers are set to delay the state’s new IVF insurance coverage law, originally effective July 1, to January 2026. Governor Gavin Newsom requested the postponement to resolve coverage details like embryo storage and donor materials. The law mandates large employers’ health plans to cover infertility diagnosis and treatment, including up to three egg retrievals and unlimited embryo transfers, benefiting nine million people, including same-sex couples and single parents. The delay has caused uncertainty and frustration among patients and employers. If not delayed, enforcement begins July 1, but most employers renew contracts in January, delaying coverage start anyway. Lawmakers will vote soon.


California lawmakers are poised to delay the state’s much-ballyhooed new law mandating in vitro fertilization insurance coverage for millions, set to take effect July 1. Gov. Gavin Newsom has asked lawmakers to push the implementation date to January 2026, leaving patients, insurers, and employers in limbo.

The law, SB 729, requires state-regulated health plans offered by large employers to cover infertility diagnosis and treatment, including IVF. Nine million people will qualify for coverage under the law. Advocates have praised the law as “a major win for Californians,” especially in making same-sex couples and aspiring single parents eligible, though cost concerns limited the mandate’s breadth.

People who had been planning fertility care based on the original timeline are now “left in a holding pattern facing more uncertainty, financial strain, and emotional distress,” Alise Powell, a director at Resolve: The National Infertility Association, said in a statement.

During IVF, a patient’s eggs are retrieved, combined with sperm in a lab, and then transferred to a person’s uterus. A single cycle can total around $25,000, out of reach for many. The California law requires insurers to cover up to three egg retrievals and an unlimited number of embryo transfers.

Not everyone’s coverage would be affected by the delay. Even if the law took effect July 1, it wouldn’t require IVF coverage to start until the month an employer’s contract renews with its insurer. Rachel Arrezola, a spokesperson for the California Department of Managed Health Care, said most of the employers subject to the law renew their contracts in January, so their employees would not be affected by a delay.

She declined to provide data on the percentage of eligible contracts that renew in July or later, which would mean those enrollees wouldn’t get IVF coverage until at least a full year from now, in July 2026 or later.

The proposed new implementation date comes amid heightened national attention on fertility coverage. California is now one of 15 states with an IVF mandate, and in February, President Donald Trump signed an executive order seeking policy recommendations to expand IVF access.

It’s the second time Newsom has asked lawmakers to delay the law. When the Democratic governor signed the bill in September, he asked the legislature to consider delaying implementation by six months. The reason, Newsom said then, was to allow time to reconcile differences between the bill and a broader effort by state regulators to include IVF and other fertility services as an essential health benefit, which would require the marketplace and other individual and small-group plans to provide the coverage.

Newsom spokesperson Elana Ross said the state needs more time to provide guidance to insurers on specific services not addressed in the law to ensure adequate and uniform coverage. Arrezola said embryo storage and donor eggs and sperm were examples of services requiring more guidance.

State Sen. Caroline Menjivar, a Democrat who authored the original IVF mandate, acknowledged a delay could frustrate people yearning to expand their families, but requested patience “a little longer so we can roll this out right.”

Sean Tipton, a lobbyist for the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, contended that the few remaining questions on the mandate did not warrant a long delay.

Lawmakers appear poised to advance the delay to a vote by both houses of the legislature, likely before the end of June. If a delay is approved and signed by the governor, the law would immediately be paused. If this does not happen before July 1, Arrezola said, the Department of Managed Health Care would enforce the mandate as it exists. All plans were required to submit compliance filings to the agency by March. Arrezola was unable to explain what would happen to IVF patients whose coverage had already begun if the delay passes after July 1.

The California Association of Health Plans, which opposed the mandate, declined to comment on where implementation efforts stand, although the group agrees that insurers need more guidance, spokesperson Mary Ellen Grant said.

Kaiser Permanente, the state’s largest insurer, has already sent employers information they can provide to their employees about the new benefit, company spokesperson Kathleen Chambers said. She added that eligible members whose plans renew on or after July 1 would have IVF coverage if implementation of the law is not delayed.

Employers and some fertility care providers appear to be grappling over the uncertainty of the law’s start date. Amy Donovan, a lawyer at insurance brokerage and consulting firm Keenan & Associates, said the firm has fielded many questions from employers about the possibility of delay. Reproductive Science Center and Shady Grove Fertility, major clinics serving different areas of California, posted on their websites that the IVF mandate had been delayed until January 2026, which is not yet the case. They did not respond to requests for comment.

Some infertility patients confused over whether and when they will be covered have run out of patience. Ana Rios and her wife, who live in the Central Valley, had been trying to have a baby for six years, dipping into savings for each failed treatment. Although she was “freaking thrilled” to learn about the new law last fall, Rios could not get clarity from her employer or health plan on whether she was eligible for the coverage and when it would go into effect, she said. The couple decided to go to Mexico to pursue cheaper treatment options.

“You think you finally have a helping hand,” Rios said of learning about the law and then, later, the requested delay. “You reach out, and they take it back.”

This article was produced by KFF Health News, which publishes California Healthline, an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation. 

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

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This story can be republished for free (details).

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free Morning Briefing.

This article first appeared on KFF Health News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

The post California’s Much-Touted IVF Law May Be Delayed Until 2026, Leaving Many in the Lurch appeared first on kffhealthnews.org



Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

This content is presented in a factual, balanced manner typical of center-left public policy reporting. It focuses on a progressive healthcare issue (mandated IVF insurance coverage) favorably highlighting benefits for diverse family structures and individuals, including same-sex couples and single parents, which often aligns with center-left values. At the same time, it includes perspectives from government officials, industry representatives, opponents, and patients, offering a nuanced view without overt ideological framing or partisan rhetoric. The emphasis on healthcare access, social equity, and patient impact situates the coverage within a center-left orientation.

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Push To Move OB-GYN Exam Out of Texas Is Piece of AGs’ Broader Reproductive Rights Campaign

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kffhealthnews.org – Annie Sciacca – 2025-06-24 04:00:00


Democratic attorneys general from California, New York, and Massachusetts are pressuring medical groups to defend reproductive rights, including medication abortion, emergency abortions, and interstate travel for care amid rising abortion bans. The AMA recommended moving medical board exams out of restrictive states or making them virtual after 20 attorneys general petitioned to protect physicians from legal risks, targeting the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology’s in-person exams in Texas. Since Roe v. Wade’s fall, 16 states banned abortions and many restrict gender-affirming care, troubling providers fearing legal consequences. The campaign highlights coordinated efforts to safeguard reproductive and LGBTQ+ health care despite opposition from anti-abortion groups.


Democratic state attorneys general led by those from California, New York, and Massachusetts are pressuring medical professional groups to defend reproductive rights, including medication abortion, emergency abortions, and travel between states for health care in response to recent increases in the number of abortion bans.

The American Medical Association adopted a formal position June 9 recommending that medical certification exams be moved out of states with restrictive abortion policies or made virtual, after 20 attorneys general petitioned to protect physicians who fear legal repercussions because of their work. The petition focused on the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology’s certification exams in Dallas, and the subsequent AMA recommendation was hailed as a win for Democrats trying to regain ground after the fall of Roe v. Wade.

“It seems incremental, but there are so many things that go into expanding and maintaining access to care,” said Arneta Rogers, executive director of the Center on Reproductive Rights and Justice at the University of California-Berkeley’s law school. “We see AGs banding together, governors banding together, as advocates work on the ground. That feels somewhat more hopeful — that people are thinking about a coordinated strategy.”

Since the Supreme Court eliminated the constitutional right to an abortion in 2022, 16 states, including Texas, have implemented laws banning abortion almost entirely, and many of them impose criminal penalties on providers as well as options to sue doctors. More than 25 states restrict access to gender-affirming care for trans people, and six of them make it a felony to provide such care to youth.

That’s raised concern among some physicians who fear being charged if they go to those states, even if their home state offers protection to provide reproductive and gender-affirming health care.

Pointing to the recent fining and indictment of a physician in New York who allegedly provided abortion pills to a woman in Texas and a teen in Louisiana, a coalition of physicians wrote in a letter to the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology that “the limits of shield laws are tenuous” and that “Texas laws can affect physicians practicing outside of the state as well.”

The campaign was launched by several Democratic attorneys general, including Rob Bonta of California, Andrea Joy Campbell of Massachusetts, and Letitia James of New York, who each have established a reproductive rights unit as a bulwark for their state following the Dobbs decision.

“Reproductive health care and gender-affirming care providers should not have to risk their safety or freedom just to advance in their medical careers,” James said in a statement. “Forcing providers to travel to states that have declared war on reproductive freedom and LGBTQ+ rights is as unnecessary as it is dangerous.”

In their petition, the attorneys general included a letter from Joseph Ottolenghi, medical director at Choices Women’s Medical Center in New York City, who was denied his request to take the test remotely or outside of Texas. To be certified by the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology, physicians need to take the in-person exam at its testing facility in Dallas. The board completed construction of its new testing facility last year.

“As a New York practitioner, I have made every effort not to violate any other state’s laws, but the outer contours of these draconian laws have not been tested or clarified by the courts,” Ottolenghi wrote.

Rachel Rebouché, the dean of Temple University’s law school and a reproductive law scholar, said “putting the heft” of the attorneys general behind this effort helps build awareness and a “public reckoning” on behalf of providers. Separately, some doctors have urged medical conferences to boycott states with abortion bans.

Anti-abortion groups, however, see the campaign as forcing providers to conform to abortion-rights views. Donna Harrison, an OB-GYN and the director of research at the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, described the petition as an “attack not only on pro-life states but also on life-affirming medical professionals.”

Harrison said the “OB-GYN community consists of physicians with values that are as diverse as our nation’s state abortion laws,” and that this diversity “fosters a medical environment of debate and rigorous thought leading to advancements that ultimately serve our patients.”

The AMA’s new policy urges specialty medical boards to host exams in states without restrictive abortion laws, offer the tests remotely, or provide exemptions for physicians. However, the decision to implement any changes to the administration of these exams is up to those boards. There is no deadline for a decision to be made.

The OB-GYN board did not respond to requests for comment, but after the public petition from the attorneys general criticizing it for refusing exam accommodations, the board said that in-person exams conducted at its national center in Dallas “provide the most equitable, fair, secure, and standardized assessment.”

The OB-GYN board emphasized that Texas’ laws apply to doctors licensed in Texas and to medical care within Texas, specifically. And it noted that its exam dates are kept under wraps, and that there have been “no incidents of harm to candidates or examiners across thousands of in-person examinations.”

Democratic state prosecutors, however, warned in their petition that the “web of confusing and punitive state-based restrictions creates a legal minefield for medical providers.” Texas is among the states that have banned doctors from providing gender-affirming care to transgender youth, and it has reportedly made efforts to get records from medical facilities and professionals in other states who may have provided that type of care to Texans.

The Texas attorney general’s office did not respond to requests for comment.

States such as California and New York have laws to block doctors from being extradited under other states’ laws and to prevent sharing evidence against them. But instances that require leveraging these laws could still mean lengthy legal proceedings.

“We live in a moment where we’ve seen actions by executive bodies that don’t necessarily square with what we thought the rules provided,” Rebouché said.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, which publishes California Healthline, an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation. 

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free Morning Briefing.

This article first appeared on KFF Health News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

The post Push To Move OB-GYN Exam Out of Texas Is Piece of AGs’ Broader Reproductive Rights Campaign appeared first on kffhealthnews.org



Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

The article presents a viewpoint largely aligned with progressive and Democratic positions on reproductive rights and gender-affirming care. It highlights efforts led by Democratic attorneys general and the American Medical Association to protect abortion access and transgender healthcare amid restrictive state laws, portraying these actions positively. While it includes perspectives from anti-abortion advocates, their views are presented briefly and framed as opposition to the broader pro-choice initiatives. The overall tone and framing emphasize support for reproductive freedom and healthcare protections, reflecting a center-left leaning stance typical of mainstream health policy reporting sympathetic to Democratic policy goals.

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