MMA News
The Play’s the Thing–to Fight Obesity
The Minnesota Medical Association, Allina Hospitals & Clinics, and PreferredOne are sponsoring performances of the play The Power of the Pyramid in 325 Twin Cities schools as a way to combat the obesity epidemic sweeping Minnesota and the nation.
In the United States, the number of overweight children between the ages of 6 and 19 has tripled during the last two decades. Many researchers are concerned that life spans will be shorter in the future if childhood obesity rates do not fall.
The National Theatre for Children, a touring company that performs in schools, created the play, which tells the story of Preston Polygon, the worst waiter in the world. To keep his job at the Pyramid Restaurant, he must become a fitness and nutrition expert in 20 minutes. To make matters worse for Preston, a mummy wants his job.
The play’s lessons will be reinforced by workbooks, take-home activities, and classroom posters. Guidebooks and curriculum aids will be made available to teachers. Allina clinics and other clinics selected by PreferredOne will receive copies of an educational game on CD-ROM and a health and fitness guide for families that doctors can give their young patients. The MMA is sending pediatricians in the Twin Cities area the game, the guide, and information about ordering these materials at no charge. Michael Ainslie, M.D., chair of the MMA Board of Trustees, says one of the benefits of the program is that it will provide physicians an entree into the topic of obesity with parents and children.
“Hopefully, all of these performances will help rally the community to understand the importance of this issue and result in it being openly discussed in schools, homes, and doctors’ offices,” he says.
Ward Eames, president of The National Theatre for Children, says using plays to deliver health messages is an approach that works with kids.
Eames says his troupe presented a similar play, The Prince of the Pyramid, to children in Maryland in the late 1990s. Tufts University researchers found that after the play and the classroom activities, students displayed a significant increase in their knowledge about nutrition and vowed to eat more fruits and vegetables and to watch less television.
Eames says plays are successful at educating children because they create a memorable and communal event. “The play creates a bedrock of shared experience that the teachers can then use as a learning tool,” he says.
The Power of the Pyramid project is an imaginative way to approach the problem of childhood obesity, says Leslie Lytle, Ph.D., an epidemiologist and senior researcher who is leading the University of Minnesota’s healthy eating research initiative for The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
Ultimately, families and schools need to make concrete changes around eating and exercise, Lytle says, but a play like The Power of the Pyramid can create the energy and focus a family might need to make those adjustments. She also notes that evidence from smoking studies shows that advice from a physician is a compelling motivator for people as well.
The MMA and the other sponsors launched the program at a press conference Jan. 24 in Minneapolis. Visit www.MMAonline.net to learn about performances at schools in 2006 and 2007.
State May Ban Lab Markups
The Minnesota Board of Medical Practice is examining laboratory billing practices and exploring whether some current practices violate existing law.
A decision from the board to prohibit markups by clinics on labwork outsourced to reference laboratories could have a significant impact on clinic billing practices. Right now, clinics may subcontract some laboratory services to out-of-state independent reference laboratories that offer discounted prices for high-volume testing. Of particular concern to the board is the practice whereby physicians or clinics bill a patient or payer for the reference lab services at a marked-up rate.
Medicare and Medicaid already prohibit clinics from marking up laboratory services provided outside of the clinic setting.
Some states have banned the practice and require the reference labs to directly bill the payer. Others allow physicians to mark up outsourced lab services, but require the physicians to disclose the name of the lab and the price of the service.
The board has asked the MMA to provide physician input on the issue.