Since the December meeting and the last newsletter there are two important items of which the membership needs to be aware. First, we have requested from the Health Care Administration Finance (HCFA) a pediatric modifier for CPT codes. It is not clear whether they will give us that. There is, however, precedent for it.
This came about after notice from the Washington Counsel of AANS the HCFA was looking at pediatric codes and felt that what they had was all they needed.
The deadline given to us was very short, however, it fortunately coincided with the ASPN meeting. We were thus, with the help of the ASPN, able to mobilize 51 members of the section and take a whole day of the meeting to review CPT codes. The product of this work was most fruitful and produced a revision of our CPT code document. The document will now have to go through many stages before we can work our way through the governmental systems to get our ideas reviewed. The first step in this process will be to form a cohesive task force which will need to be appointed over the next few months. This task force will find itself with considerable work. It will need to get together literally within a day or two notice. The deadlines we were given frequently is minimal, sometimes with in a week.
Once a task force has reviewed and revised the document in the proper form, we will need to go through American Medical Association (AMA) channels to have our ideas reviewed. Along the way a practice survey will be required, which as many of you will know requires significant paper work. We will need approximately 50 to 75 people who are willing to put aside their work for a day and spend time participating in the survey. This group will be necessary for the continued existence of pediatric neurosurgery from a practical, that is financial, standpoint.
The next major development has been draft #5 of the severe head injury guidelines by the Trauma Section. This is the first draft I have reviewed. This document deals with head injuries in adults. The Pediatric Section is currently working with the American Academy of Pediatrics to develop similar guidelines for pediatric head injuries. These two documents can, hopefully, be combined into a unified parameter of practice. Tom Luerssen,MD has received very few volunteers for his request to work on the pediatric guidelines. This is a very major undertaking and requires literature searchers and reviewing of vast amounts of material. It cannot be done by one person and, in fact, requires a committee of approximately 10 to best accomplish. I hope some of you will consider becoming involved with this important project.
Bob Florin has been of great aid to the section in both of the above noted projects. These issues consume the majority of his time and we need to commend him for this.
Joint Section Status
Our formal joint section status with the Congress is still not complete because of changes required in our by-laws. Essentially, they are minor changes and hopefully a new draft of by laws will be circulated in the near future.
We were honored at the April meeting to have John Holter as our Matson lecturer. As all of you know, he essentially is the father of the modern day shunt. His talk was well received.
Section on Pediatric Neurological Surgery Annual Meeting
The Annual Meeting of the Section of Pediatric Neurological Surgery, jointly sponsored by The American Association of Neurological Surgeons, will be held December 6-99, 1995, at the Huntington Ritz Carlton Hotel in Pasadena, California. Specific details will be available later in the summer.
Research Funding
The Research Foundation of the AANS this year presented a grant for research in pediatric neurosurgery supported by the pediatric section. The recipient was Mark Dias, of the State University of New York at Buffalo, who will work on a project entitled “Spinal Cord Histogenesis in an Animal Model of Neural Tube Defect.” The selection committee was very careful to use our foundation donation for a pediatric topic. The Grant section will need to decide whether this is an effort which we should continue to support if our financial status allows us, on an every other or every third year basis.
It has been an education and a pleasure to serve as chairman of the Pediatric Section. I wish Harold Rekate, MD the best as he takes over this position. I encourage the membership to support Hal in this endeavor both emotionally and by volunteering their services when requested. I want to thank, again, all the members who have helped me over the past couple of years.