Thursday, August 13, 2009
Following the appointment to several new posts, a Presbyterian Hospital physician will be working to resolve several of the nation's most taxing healthcare issues related to emergency medicine.
Charles A. Bregier Jr., M.D., FACEP, has been elected to serve as President-Elect of the North Carolina College of Emergency Physicians (NCCEP). He will serve in this role from 2009-2010 and then become President of NCCEP from 2010-2011. In addition to his state level duties, Dr. Bregier has been reappointed as Chair of the national Reimbursement Committee in the American College of Emergency Room Physicians (ACEP) for a second term.
An emergency medicine veteran for the past 25 years, Dr. Bregier is the medical director of several of Presbyterian Hospitals’ urgent care centers. “The top issues NCCEP and ACEP are focusing on include improving access to emergency department care, addressing our state and nation’s mental health crisis, liability reform and improving commercial payor reimbursements for patient care delivered,” Dr. Bregier said.
Nationally, patient visits to emergency departments are swelling to record breaking levels. “Emergency department use is up around the nation, but the amount of beds available has decreased,” said Bregier. Skyrocketing job losses is a contributing factor. With unemployment comes the loss of health insurance and affordable access to doctors, forcing many people to seek basic, non urgent healthcare services from the emergency department.
To help relieve crowding, urgent care centers provide a viable alternative for patients. Dr. Bregier explained, “Urgent care centers offer fast, non-emergent care to patients, from treating colds, respiratory infections to broken bones.”
Dr. Bregier and his group will seek additional support to help patients with mental illness. “The mental health delivery system in our country is broken,” he said. Drastic reduction in mental health funding and closure of psychiatric units in community hospitals are among the many challenges that place strain not only on patients and their families, but on local providers as well.
While patient care is the focus of healthcare, attention to the operational side of medicine is paramount. Dr. Bregier and his peers will seek improvements in the areas of liability reform and ensuring fair payment practices are followed in the commercial payor arena. “Emergency departments must be run efficiently in order to keep our doors open,” he said.
There is one sole reason behind the work of Dr. Bregier and his colleagues. “The delivery of high quality patient care is at the heart of everything we do,” added Dr. Bregier. “Our groups are working hard to ensure that patients in our communities have prompt access to the care they need, whether it be in the emergency department for a heart attack, in an urgent care center for an ankle fracture or a primary care physician’s office.”
Dr. Bregier has a medical degree from Wayne State University and an undergraduate degree in zoology from the University of Michigan. Following the completion of his internship and residency the Bowman Gray School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, Dr. Bregier joined the USAF Medical Corps as an attending physician at USAF Regional Hospital-Eglin in Florida. He has been practicing Emergency and Urgent Care Medicine in Charlotte since 1987.
A recipient of numerous awards and professional appointments, he is an American Board of Emergency Medicine Diplomat. He is also a certified Medical Review Officer (MRO). A prolific presenter, Dr. Bregier routinely lectures on industry topics such as youth caregivers in North Carolina, worker’s compensation best practices and more.
