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Requires On-Site Licensed Medical Professional at Kidney Dialysis Clinics and Establishes Other State Requirements. Initiative Statute.
This is the third attempt at requiring at least one licensed medical practitioner (whether a doctor, nurse, LVN or Physicians Assistant with 6 months experience) to be present at clinics when dialysis is being given. Anecdotally, the experience of our Public Policy Analyst is a case in point. Her mother had no such personnel at her dialysis clinic and contracted a blood infection that went undetected and settled into her bones. It was dismissed by clinic workers as arthritis. It was so painful the mother could not make her dialysis appointments and, despite hospitalization, was too weakened and died.
It seems imperative that medical personnel oversee routine blood screening and other medically necessary issues. There is a provision for exemption for the state’s staffing shortage due to COVID. However, it is a necessary precaution for patients that will not raise the price and push patients on even Medi-Cal from access to the services.
The proposition also requires the private clinics to disclose ownership interests by participating physicians and others. Hence the opposition from those clinics.
Opponents further accuse SEIU-UHW West, the Proposition’s union backer, of using this requirement to force unionization. For the life of us, we cannot see a link between the union’s desire to organize and these requirements. Proposition 29 makes sound medical sense and puts patients first before private clinic profits. We urge a YES vote on this measure.