Message from the Director Fall 2015
Greetings!
Welcome to the inaugural
issue of OWH Insights by the
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office on Women’s Health
(OWH). OWH Insights provides
quarterly information about policies, programs, initiatives, and events
related to the health of our nation’s women and girls. Our hope is that this
newsletter will help you gain a better understanding of OWH’s activities. We
will also share relevant information affecting the field of women’s health.
In this issue of OWH Insights, we highlight recent
activities that promoted women’s health around topics like caregiving, healthy
aging, and the future of research.
Learn about:
- Clarifications of the Affordable Care Act
- Healthy Aging Summit 2015
- Support for Nursing Moms Webinar
- iGIANT Roundtable Discussion
- IPV Provider Network Grant Awards
- Women’s Equality Day 2015
We want to hear from you!
Let us know what you think about OWH
Insights and how we can serve you better. Send feedback to womenshealth@hhs.gov.
Enjoy!
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Nancy C. Lee, M.D. Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health-Women's Health Director, Office on Women's Health
Women's Health Highlights
FAQs Issued to Clarify Provisions of the ACA Related to Women’s Health
This summer, the
U.S. Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, and the Treasury provided
clarity for consumers and insurance companies about preventive services covered
under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The health care law requires most private plans
to cover preventive services like contraception without any out-of-pocket
costs. However, since the law’s enactment, women have raised concerns that their
insurance providers were not covering the recommended methods of contraception.
To clear up the
confusion, the FAQs explain that plans and issuers must cover — without cost
sharing — at least one form of contraception in each of the eighteen methods that
the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has identified for women in its current Birth Control Guide. If an FDA-approved service or item is not covered but an individual’s
health care provider determines that it is medically necessary, then the
insurance provider must cover that service or item without cost sharing. Coverage
also includes patient education and counseling.
The FAQs also
clarify other points:
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Plans or issuers cannot limit sex-specific preventive services based on an individual’s sex assigned at birth, gender identity, or recorded gender. If a health care provider determines that a preventive service is medically appropriate for the individual, the plan or issuer must provide coverage without cost sharing.
- If a plan or
issuer covers dependent children, the recommended preventive services for those
dependent children must be covered without cost sharing.
- Patients will not
need to pay a co-pay, co-insurance, or deductible for the anesthesia related to
a colonoscopy performed as a preventive screening procedure for colorectal
cancer if a health provider determines that the anesthesia is medically
appropriate.
Office on Women's Health Activities
Healthy Aging
Summit 2015
The HHS Office of Disease Prevention and Health
Promotion hosted the first national Healthy Aging Summit in Washington, D.C., on
July 27 and 28, 2015. The Summit focused on increasing our understanding
of the social, environmental, and emotional factors that influence health in
the later years of life. The Summit sought to highlight interventions and
strategies that will optimize the health and quality of life of older Americans
and reduce costs to the health care system.
As a Summit co-sponsor, OWH was part of the conference
steering committee and hosted a unique panel presentation on the physical,
mental, and spiritual challenges of family caregiving. The presentation also
highlighted the resources available to protect the health and well-being of
family caregivers, the majority of whom are women. The panel, facilitated
by Dr. Nancy Lee, included Ms. Gail Hunt, CEO, National Caregivers Alliance;
Ms. Ann-Ellis Carthern, retired registered nurse and family caregiver; Ms.
Margaret Kabat, LCSW-C, CCM, acting national director, U.S. Department of Veterans
Affairs Caregiver Support Program; and Dr. Karen Huss, National Institute of
Nursing Research. The presentations highlighted research about trends in
caregiving across various sectors in the United States and shared insights from
government and nonprofits.
In conjunction with the 2015 Healthy Aging Summit, OWH, the Office of Disease
Prevention and Health Promotion, the Association of State and Territorial
Health Officials (ASTHO), and the National Association of States United for
Aging and Disabilities co-hosted a one-day workshop to engage state teams and
HHS regional liaisons to identify priorities for promoting healthy aging. Attendees
included state health officers and officials from 45 states and the District of
Columbia. These activities align with ASTHO’s President’s
Challenge, led by Dr. Jewel Mullen. The
workshop had two major goals:
-
Improve the capacity of states to successfully implement healthy aging initiatives by facilitating state-to-state and regional sharing of promising strategies and common challenges
- Mobilize
action in states through the creation of state-level healthy aging implementation
and action plans
After
two informative days of science-based sessions at the Healthy Aging Summit, state
teams discussed the social determinants of health and opportunities for
collaboration to improve the health of seniors across the country. The most
common priorities identified by participants included fall, injury, and
violence prevention; mental health and cognition (including Alzheimer’s disease
and dementia); tobacco cessation; physical activity, nutrition, and weight
status; and caregiver support. Emerging
priorities included volunteerism, occupational safety, food insecurity,
medication assistance, and domestic abuse. The full document of states and
their identified priorities will be available in autumn 2015.
Supports for Nursing Moms Webinar
On August 26, OWH and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) co-hosted
a webinar for the Chief Human Capital Officer Council, in support of National
Breastfeeding Month. The webinar engaged supervisory- and management-level
staff across the government in a discussion on Supporting Nursing Moms at Work: Employer Solutions and efforts to support the return of breastfeeding
mothers to the workplace. OPM also shared examples of successful worksite
lactation programs from across the government. The webinar concluded with
a Q&A session where participants shared comments and other successful
strategies that support nursing mothers in the workplace.
iGIANT Roundtable Discussion
OWH hosted a roundtable discussion to explore the impact of gender and sex
on innovation and novel technologies for organizations that have or are in the
process of developing a gender or sex-specific product, program, policy, or
protocol. The initiative, iGIANT, was developed by the White House Office of
Science and Technology Policy to begin a dialogue about best practices in
product development and to inspire participants to serve as ambassadors for
innovation. The discussion brought together stakeholders from government,
industry, academia, professional societies, and advocacy groups. Approximately
20 participants presented overviews of their design elements and discussed
challenges and opportunities to further the initiative. The roundtable
discussion was the first in a series of nationwide roundtables focusing on the
iGIANT initiative in the transportation, information technology, and retail
sectors.
The Interpersonal Violence (IPV)
Provider Network Grant Awards
OWH created the IPV Provider Network grants to address the needs of victims
of interpersonal violence. The funds will support strategies to develop
policies and standard procedures that provide comprehensive responses to
victims of violence in health care settings.
OWH awarded $3.7 million to five organizations to test models and
strategies that improve standards for documentation and communication and
integrate screening and brief counseling into routine practice. Award
recipients will implement plans to develop educational toolkits and
certification materials that help providers and IPV service programs ensure that
victims of violence receive the best possible care.
The following organizations were
selected to participate:
- Regents of
the University of California, San Francisco
- University
of North Texas Health Science Center
- Johns
Hopkins University
- Regents of
the University of Minnesota
- North
Carolina Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Inc.
Women’s Equality Day 2015
On August 26, 2015, we celebrated Women’s Equality Day to commemorate
the 95th anniversary of American women winning the right to vote. President
Obama issued a presidential proclamation, and OWH joined OPM’s Division of Diversity and
Inclusion to engage HHS employees in a panel discussion on equal rights, equal
pay and employment, and women’s health.
The 2015 Women’s Equality Day program opened with remarks from John
Gill, HHS deputy
assistant secretary for human resources. The
event was facilitated by Jennifer Bishop-Crawford, director of OWH’s Division
of Strategic Communication, who also provided background and perspective on the
occasion. Following an overview of Women’s Equality Day, Dr. Hannah Valantine,
NIH’s chief officer for scientific workforce diversity, delivered a keynote
address covering several notable accomplishments of women pioneers. The program
concluded with panel presentations from OWH Director Dr. Nancy Lee, FDA’s Dr.
Jonca Bull, and OPM’s Sharon Wong and with questions from program attendees.
The 2015 Women’s Equality Day program was broadcast via HHS Live Streaming. The
recording can be viewed at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q13mDAUdRKw.
National
Family Caregivers Month November
2015
ACA Open
Enrollment November 1, 2015–January 31, 2016
World
AIDS Day
December
1, 2015
National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day March 10, 2016
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