Greetings. We have had an interesting few weeks with regards to healthcare in the legislative arena. Like many legislative efforts, it was a long hard fight that took a lot of time and resources. Providing a mode for a legislative voice is a key value to our members and subsequently, it is why it is critically important that you remain involved and engaged.

Did you know that the VPTA has recently created an Events Task Force? This selected group of members has come together to look for new and exciting ways to make membership valuable by improving our educational events and membership meetings. Like most organizations, one of the most common question that we ask is "how can we improve upon what we offer". The Board of Directors of the VPTA has fully supported an appointed Task Force to challenge the status quo and to look for ways to move educational events around the state, make members meetings exciting and meaningful, look for ways to increase membership involvement and foster new leaders within our organization.

As our social media outlets have grown (thank you for Liking on Facebook and following on Twitter!), so has interest in publicizing various jobs and courses on our pages. The VPTA has adopted a policy that is consistent with our paid advertising on the website. Pending approval by the VPTA President, we will advertise all philanthropic courses for FREE on our sites. Click the link below to see the rates and durations for advertising all for-profit courses and job postings. Please see the full post on our website and pinned to the top of our Facebook page for more details!

Blue Ridge District just held their winter meeting at Winchester Brew Works on Feb 8th! The turn out was great and everyone enjoyed brews and local pizza. The brewery is co-owned by one of BRD's own PTs, Jeff Landy! While there was a brief business meeting, the focus of the meeting was networking between student and clinician attendants from across the BRD.

We look forward to seeing everyone at our May meeting in Charlottesville. Time and place are still to be determined so look out for details as the date draws closer!

On January 23, the Tidewater District hosted its first meeting of the year at Pivot Physical Therapy's Oyster Point location. Pivot also sponsored refreshments for the meeting. There were 41 guests in attendance (25 clinicians, 16 students) for the business meeting and special presentation. Thank you to the speakers, Matthew Dancigers (PT) and Spencer Muro (PT), for sharing their knowledge and insight on pain neuroscience and implications for clinicians.

On January 17th at Inova Physical Therapy Centers in Alexandria, Daren Moat PT, MBA, presented on Leadership, "Thinking like a CEO of your own PT career" . Daren, who is a John Maxwell Certified Coach, gave the group insight on aiding individuals with personal and professional growth goals and carrier development.  This was a very well attended meeting and we look forward to having Daren work with our team again in the near future.

To provide the means for two entry-level PT students and/or post-professional residents in geriatric physical therapy the opportunity to engage in advocacy efforts of the profession at a national level with the intention that this exposure will engage students/residents in similar efforts after their graduation.

Late last week, Sharon Dunn, APTA President, and Justin Moore, APTA CEO, sent out an email announcing a $500 billion bipartisan budget deal was passed by Congress and signed by The President that would fund the federal government through March 23, 2018. This new legislation will provide a permanent fix to the Medicare Part B therapy cap, thereby eliminating the need to fix this issue on an annual basis. The cost of the permanent fix to the therapy cap was estimated at $6.47 billion.

When Congress adopted a federal spending package that included the elimination of the hard cap on Medicare therapy services, it didn't just remove a rule—lawmakers also adopted a new system of payment thresholds and triggers, and a differential payment rate for physical therapist assistants (PTAs) and occupational therapy assistants (OTAs), among other things.