Senator seeks to extend patients' bill of rights to feds

Federal employees could soon have additional health care protection thanks to a last-minute amendment by Sen. Don Nickles, R.-Okla., to the hotly debated "patients' bill of rights." Approved by the Senate on June 29, and officially known as the Bipartisan Patients' Protection Act of 2001 (S. 1052), the patients' bill of rights would give private sector employees direct access to pediatricians, obstetricians and gynecologists, and the right to go to the nearest emergency room without being penalized by their health maintenance organization. Nickles' amendment, which also passed, extends those rights to federal employees as well. The bill will now go to the House for a vote. "Federal employees don't have these patient protections. We are getting ready to mandate something on the private sector that we forgot to do for the public sector," Nickles said in introducing the amendment. By offering his amendment, Nickles hoped to make a point about how Congress treats the federal government, according to his press secretary, Gayle Osterberg. "When it comes to setting requirements for the federal government, we're more concerned about cost than we are when it comes to the private sector," Osterberg said. Health plans serving the federal government contend that federal employees already have many of the rights that Nickles' amendment would extend and objected to the amendment's extension of the right to sue the federal government for non-economic damages such as pain and suffering, as well as punitive damages, and allowing independent review boards to oversee appeals. Currently, federal workers enrolled in the Federal Employees Health Benefit Program (FEHBP) are covered under a patients' bill of rights crafted during the Clinton administration. Some health care providers say that's all the protection federal employees need. "We believe there is sufficient accountability and regulatory oversight by [the Office of Personnel Management] and a workable disputed claims appeals system in place," said Stephen W. Gammarino, senior vice president of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. "Each year, consumers give the FEHBP plans high consumer satisfaction ratings." New liability provisions and benefit appeals procedures would also be problematic, Gammarino said, and could potentially result in increased premiums.