The article, “Understanding the RUC” (June 2011), was nothing more than an advocacy piece masquerading as scholarship. It was designed to bolster support within the AAOS for a process that accrues to the direct financial benefit of orthopaedic surgeons, while ignoring the RUC process’s extraordinary cost to patient care quality, purchasers, primary care, medicine in general, and the larger American economy.

As the author of several recent articles critical of the RUC, I invite AAOS to engage in a comprehensive, objective discussion of the RUC’s composition, methodology, and impact. I would be glad to present why the RUC is the very center of the American healthcare cost crisis, why it has ultimately corroded the professionalism of proceduralists, including orthopaedic surgeons, and why it needs to be either fixed or replaced.

Brian Klepper, PhD
Atlantic Beach, Fla.

Editor’s note: Dr. Klepper is a healthcare analyst, business development consultant, writer, and speaker. In response to his offer, AAOS Now has extended an invitation to him to submit an article on fixing the RUC.

Opting out of PDRP
As stated in the New England Journal of Medicine editorial of May 26, 2011, doctors can prevent access to and use of their drug prescription data—although how to do so is not well known and poorly publicized.

AAOS fellows, even if those who are not members of the American Medical Association (AMA), can opt out of the sale of their AMA data for this purpose through the AMA Physician Data Restriction Program (PDRP). This is accessible on the AMA website by all physicians.

Roy T. Lefkoe, MD
Bala Cynwyd, Pa.

The AMA Physician Data Restriction Program can be found here, or use your smart phone to access it here: