Pharmacy Legislative Day

On February 2nd, 2011 we hosted our Pharmacy Legislative Day.  The day started at the University Club in St. Paul with speakers Tim, Julie Johnson, Cody Wiberg and Matt Lemke.  The morning session briefly discussed our main concerns in this legislative session and talked briefly on our top seven then had some round table discussions for everyone to get more acquainted with the topics from specialists in the field.  The priority items in this legislative session are: the third party audit bill, medication therapy management expansion, pharmaceutical waste, MERC funding, medicinal marijuana, the health care home model, and electronic prescribing.  You can find copies of most of these leave-behinds on the MPhA website for future legislative vistis.

Following the morning session everyone was given the opportunity to meet with their senator or representative at the Capitol.  The MPhA office attempted to get meetings set up ahead of time for the constituents and this resulted in getting 49 meetings set up for 35 constituents.  It was reported that those that had meetings really enjoyed the opportunity to talk about pharmacy issues and let their legislature know that they have a resource in their community.

To conclude the evening we returned to the University Club to sit down and talk with a few senators and representatives about some of our current pharmacy issues.  We were joined by:

Representative Jim Abeler from district 48B (Anoka, MN); he is the chair of the Health & Human Services Finance committee and also is on the Health & Human Services Reform and Ways & Means committees.

Representative Steve Gottwalt from district 15A (St. Cloud); he is the chair of the Health & Human Services Reform committee and sits on the Health & Human Services Reform and Taxes committees.

Representative Erin Murphy from district 64A (St. Paul); she is on the Health & Human Services Finance and Reform committees as well as the Rules and Legislative Administration committee.

Senator Linda Berglin from district 61 (Minneapolis; she is on the Health & Human Services, Capitol Investment, Finance, and Rules and Administration committees.

Senator David Hann from district 42 (Eden Prairie); he is on the Health & Human Services, Education and Finance committees.

A special thanks goes out to all of them for their time and interest in our profession.

We had a great turn out at this year’s Pharmacy Legislative Day but making a difference takes more than one day.  I encourage everyone to stay in touch with your legislators especially when new information comes available.  For those that did not have the opportunity or were unable to make it to meetings with your legislators I encourage you to make an appointment, write a letter or email, or call your legislators to let them know that you are their community resource and are available to help them if any questions about pharmacy come up.