Megan Hashbarger, DPC Vice President of Government Relations
In October 2023, DPC held its’ annual Advocacy Day in Washington, D.C. This year, we were able to bring over 50 patients to D.C. from 23 different states. Unfortunately, due to Covid complications and for the best safety of our patients, we did end up having to make their Hill meetings virtual. Despite this, we were still able to meet with almost 60 Congressional offices about issues facing dialysis patients such as the need for access to Medigap and private insurance. We were also able to host a day of advocacy training for our patient ambassadors, bringing in stakeholders from various sectors, including Chris Bowlin (Executive Director, Head of Public Policy and Government Relations, Cormedix) and Colin Roskey, (Executive Director, Kidney Care Partners) to represent the kidney community, Melanie Egorin (Assistant Secretary for Legislation, (ASL) U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)), and The Honorable Tom Reed (Former Member of Congress, NY-23rd) to give their perspectives of working on kidney priorities. We look forward to hosting this year’s Advocacy Day in May – this is a great experience for our patients and a wonderful opportunity to elevate the ESRD patient perspective.
