About MSSNY

DOCTOR, WHY DO YOU NEED MSSNY?

About The Medical Society of The State of NY

Welcome to the website of the Medical Society of the State of New York, representing the interests of patients and physicians in an ongoing effort to assure quality health care services for all New Yorkers.

The Medical Society of the State of New York (MSSNY) is an organization of approximately 30,000 licensed physicians, medical residents, and medical students in New York State. Members participate in both the state society and in their local county medical societies.

MSSNY is a non-profit organization committed to representing the medical profession as a whole and advocating health related rights, responsibilities and issues. MSSNY strives to promote and maintain high standards in medical education and in the practice of medicine in an effort to ensure that quality medical care is available to the public.

Whether you’re in independent practice or you work for a large group or institution, your future depends on a strong state medical society.

• MSSNY consistently quashes or modifies legislative proposals that would adversely impact your ability to deliver care to your patients.
• MSSNY consistently fights to assure that you, a trained physician – not insurance companies or government – determine the appropriate course of care for your patients’ conditions and circumstances.
• MSSNY helps you negotiate employment contracts that don’t leave you out on a limb after the initial honeymoon period ends.
• MSSNY provides information, education and insights to help you planfor the future and advance your career.

During this Corona virus crisis, among many other activities:

• MSSNY is at the table with our NYS Vaccine Distribution and Implementation Task Force as they work to ensure a seamless vaccine roll out. We worked with the New York Congressional Delegation, AMA and federation of medicine to establish and assist physicians in navigating various stimulus programs that have provided a lifeline to physician practices.
• Our advocacy resulted in actions by the New York DFS and DOH to greatly expand coverage for telehealth via video and audio-only, and in enactment of liability protections for the period of the Covid-19 emergency that have been a model for the nation.
• We have urged the commercial health industry in New York to establish advance payment programs that have been initiated by United, CDPHP, and Empire.
• Just when it’s needed most, MSSNY’s Physician Wellness and Resilience Committee’s Peer to Peer Program has now been actualized. Please spread the word about our confidential helpline phone number (1-844-P2P-PEER) and email address ([email protected]).

In the last few legislative sessions, we have faced an onslaught of proposals which would have adversely impacted the practice of medicine, and we achieved real and substantial victories:

• Reduced administrative hassles by enacting legislation:
  • to reduce credentialing delays and enable override of insurer step therapy protocols
  • to reduce the need to obtain prior authorization when connected to services for which one was already granted
  • to reduce the time for claims to be paid
  • to require insurers to provide comprehensive data to demonstrate their compliance with mental health and substance abuse parity laws
• Working together with affected specialty societies, our advocacy resulted in
  • the defeat of proposals that would have significantly curtailed due process protections for all physicians against whom a complaint is
    filed with OPMC
  • the defeat of proposals that would have imposed huge new costs on physicians who receive coverage through the Excess Medical Liability
    Insurance Program
• Our advocacy resulted in important public health achievements, including
  • assuring that medical contraindications are the only valid exception to
  • required immunizations
  • raising the legal tobacco purchase age to 21
  • preventing the sale of flavored vaping products
• Our advocacy resulted in the defeat of proposals
  • that would have imposed significant new requirements on physicians prior to prescribing any opioid medication and other practice mandates
  • that would have expanded the scope of practice of numerous non-physician practitioners
  • that could have raised your liability costs through changing lossallocation rules in malpractice cases involving multiple defendants
  • that would have limited injured worker choice of physician in theWorkers Compensation program