A multi-million dollar television and radio advertising campaign launched by the AMA on Friday, October 7, 2011, is urging physicians and their patients to tell members of Congress that now is the time to repeal Medicare’s flawed sustainable growth rate (SGR) formula. The campaign is scheduled to run two weeks and airs on national cable television (CNN and Fox), and on broadcast television (ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC) in a select number of broadcast markets. A 60-second radio ad is also airing in select markets.

View the TV spot at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IM0giJ1foOY.

Listen to the radio version at: http://www.ama-assn.org/resources/audio/washington/ama-sgr-radio-ad-07oct2011.mp3.

Medicare physician payments are scheduled to be slashed nearly 30 percent January 1, 2012. Results from an AMA poll released last week shows an overwhelming number of Americans, 94 percent, believe a 30 percent cut would be a serious problem for seniors.

The NCMS has been urging members of the North Carolina Congressional Delegation to repeal the SGR and develop a new method of determining Medicare reimbursements to physicians that more accurately reflects the actual cost of delivery of care.