Medical groups concerned that RFK Jr. may dismiss panel of primary care experts : NPR

The secretary of health and social services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. examines during a press conference at the USDA headquarters in Washington, DC, on July 14. The best medical groups are alarmed by a report that Kennedy could remove another advisory panel.

Brendan Smialowski / AFP via Getty Images

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Brendan Smialowski / AFP via Getty Images

The Secretary of Health and Social Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., could soon reject the members of the US preventive services working group, an advisory group of primary care experts, raising the “deep concern” of the American Medical Association and other best medical groups.

The plan was reported for the first time in The Wall Street Journal. “It is very worrying – and this is not the first time that we have been concerned,” said Dr. Bobby Mukkamala, president of the AMA. NPR has not independently confirmed the plan.

Last month, Kennedy rejected the members of another advisory committee – one on vaccines for the CDC – and replaced them with his own choices, which largely lacked expertise in vaccines, immunology and patient care that members generally have.

Mukkamala is worried, the same could happen now with the USPSTF. The independent expert group focuses on primary care and is summoned by the Agency for Research and Quality of Health Care, as part of the Ministry of Health and Social Services, which is supervised by Kennedy.

“When you have something good and you don’t know if it will be replaced by something good, it’s just a risk that nobody takes,” said Mukkamala.

The Ministry of Health and Social Services did not immediately respond to a request for comments.

The USPSTF has examined data and makes recommendations to prevent all kinds of diseases since 1984.

“Probably all the patients I see, I use about five to 20 of his directives to make sure that I keep this person in good health,” said Dr. Alexander Krist, family doctor at Virginia Commonwealth University and former president of the working group. For example, these directives are used for mammograms for breast cancer screening, colonoscopies for colon cancer or high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity, depression or anxiety, he says.

Overall, the USPSTF organizes around 100 guidelines for preventive care, by addressing the care of newborns to the elderly.

Many primary care clinicians consider that the managers of the working group are the “most reliable source of their recommendations,” said Dr. Michael Barry, internal medicine researcher and professor at the Harvard Medical School, also a former member and president of the USPSTF. “This confidence is based on being consistent over 40 years, using the same rules over time, paying attention to the fact that the new members join, they are verified for conflicts of interest and that they systematically apply the methods of the working group to make decisions.”

The dismissal of all current USPSTF members could lead doctors to lose confidence in the directives. “Clinicians will find it difficult to understand what they should do and to whom they should listen to preventive care for America,” said Krist.

Since the affordable care law in 2010, USPSTF guidelines have also been linked to what most insurers cover.

Earlier this month, the AMA, as well as more than 100 other health organizations, sent a letter to the members of the Congress, in response to Kennedy canceling a previously planned meeting of the USPSTF. The letter urged Congress to protect “the integrity of the USPSTF against intentional or unintentional political interference”. The signatories warned: “The loss of reliability in rigorous and not partisan work of the working group would devastate patients, hospital systems and payers.”

The AMA followed a letter to Kennedy on Sunday, expressing its objections to the reported plans. The 16 members of the “Dedicate working group[e] Their time to help reduce diseases and improve the health of all Americans – a well -aligned mission with the Make America Healthy Again initiative, “said the letter, urging Kennedy to keep current members and continue its regular meeting calendar.