This week I introduced two bills to help solve an issue that affects nearly everyone in our state - access to quality health care.
For generations, community doctors have treated entire families -- delivering babies and healing everything from chicken pox to heart disease. Small-town doctors help hold communities together.
I believe everyone deserves access to this kind of quality health care. But times are changing, and New Mexico faces a serious shortage of primary care providers in every county but one. It's most acute in our rural communities. This is impacting the health and economic well-being of rural residents and Native communities alike.
For our veterans living in rural communities - including a third of all veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - access to care is especially challenging. Veterans from across New Mexico have told me about their frustrations with having to drive hours to see a mental health specialist to treat PTSD, for example, or with the high turnover among doctors and staff at rural veterans clinics.
I've always said we need more preventive and primary care to keep people healthy and ensure they're treated in the doctor's office and not the ER. We need to make sure New Mexico families can get that care.
I've been talking with veterans in communities from
Raton
to
Roswell
, and with patients and health care professionals from
Catron County
to Albuquerque - as well as experts from across the medical community - about what we need to do to turn this problem around. This week, I've introduced two bills to tackle the problem directly.
My Increasing Primary Care Access Act will encourage more nurses and doctors to live and work in rural areas and on tribal lands. It will also provide incentives for young graduates to return to their communities, where the need is greatest, and attract medical professionals from other states as well.
The Rural Veterans Improvement Act will create similar incentives that attract and retain doctors to rural VA clinics and help military doctors transition to practice in the VA. It will help ensure resources are available to help rural veterans with transportation to far-away doctors' appointments, expand the options for veterans' mental health care, and make the VA take a hard look at care delivered at local Community-Based Outpatient Clinics (CBOCs) to prioritize repairs and expansions.
Watch my video about how rural New Mexico veterans would be helped by my bill:
Improving access to health care doesn't just improve our health - it improves the economic well-being of our communities. The health care industry in New Mexico is expected to grow by 20 percent over the next 10 years - which can generate more than 30,000 new jobs - and we want these jobs spread throughout all 33 counties.
No matter where you live, you should have access to quality, affordable health care, and I'll continue working to make this a reality.
