Health Care Blog

Overcoming Society’s Barriers to Bring Mobility to the World

Ralph Braun is being recognized as a Champion of Change for leading education and employment efforts in science, technology, engineering and math for Americans with disabilities.

I was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy when I was just six years old. Doctors told my parents I’d only live to be a young teenager. They encouraged my parents to leave me behind to be studied and to be institutionalized. Fortunately, my parents refused. 

Years later, we discovered that the doctors had diagnosed me with the wrong type of MD. Eventually the disease took away my strength, just not as quickly as the doctors had originally thought. By the time I was 13, I was relying on piggyback rides from my dad to get out of my wheelchair and into the backseat of my family’s car. Back then accessibility simply did not exist. My parents fought our local school board to have an elevator installed in our brand new high school; and they lost. My classmates had to carry me to many of my classrooms. Nothing came easily, but my parents never let me feel sorry for myself.

I wanted an education, a career and a family – I just had to work a little harder at it. With the help of my family, I invented a motorized scooter (I called it the Tri-Wheeler) so I could conserve energy. The Tri-Wheeler is what allowed me to maintain my job as a Quality Control Inspector at a nearby factory. When that factory moved several miles from my home, I had to figure out a way to get to and from my job no matter the distance or the weather.

New Report: Health Care Law Invests in Nurses

Note: This live session of Office Hours has concluded. Check out the full question and answer session below or at Storify.com

Today, we are excited to celebrate the start of National Nurses Week. Nurses are at the center of the American health system.  And they do it all, from delivering preventive care to our children to helping seniors manage chronic disease. 

Thanks to the President’s new health care law, there will be significantly more nurses to help make our health care system stronger.  The Obama Administration is committed to educating new nurses, improving the training of today’s nurses, and placing nurses in the parts of the country where they are needed most.

The new law and the Obama Administration are investing in education and training opportunities for nurses. According to a new report we released today:

• The number of National Health Service Corps primary care providers nearly tripled between 2009 and 2011 with support from Affordable Care Act, the Recovery Act and ongoing appropriations, supporting more than 1,900 nurse practitioners and certified nurse midwives.
• Since the beginning of 2009, community health centers have added about 3,000 nursing positions, including 800 in advanced practice, a 20 percent increase. 
• The Affordable Care Act’s investment in Nurse Managed Clinics is projected to help train more than 900 nurses by 2013 and serve 94,000 patients.
• The Affordable Care Act’s Prevention and Public Health Fund is supporting the training of 600 new nurse practitioners and nurse midwives by 2015.
• Training and educational support programs reauthorized through the Affordable Care Act are supporting more than 50,000 nurses and students.

To kick off National Nurses Week and discuss what the health law means for nurses, we’ll be hosting a session of Office Hours on Monday, May 7th at 3:30pm EST with Mary Wakefield, a Registered Nurse and Administrator of the Health Resources and Services Administration, which runs many of the programs that help train and support nurses. 

Here’s how White House Office Hours work:

• Ask your questions now and during the live event on Twitter with the hashtag #WHChat
• Follow the Q&A live through the @WHLive Twitter account
• If you miss the live session, the full session will be posted on WhiteHouse.gov and Storify.com/WhiteHouse

We hope you’ll join us!