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REPLY ONCE PER DISCUSSION POSTS TWO POSTS TOREPLY TO
DISCUSSION TOPIC
Go to the Library of Congress website ( https://www.loc.gov ). Find a piece of legislation on a topic of interest to you. In your own words, report what you found. Identify a bill by name and number. Who is the sponsor of this bill? When and what was the last action taken on this bill? If this bill has already passed both houses and signed by the President, when did it become law? Is there a public law number? Briefly, tell us, in your own words, what this proposed legislation is about. Provide a direct link to this bill/law. Then, see if you can find this same bill on the govtrack.us ( https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/ ) website. Is there any additional useful information that you can find on this site?
DISCUSSION POST RUBRIC
Interacts substantively with 2 or more peers in a discussion forum. 100 WORD MINIMUM PER REPLY. Posts are well-articulated and understandable.  No noticeable spelling or grammatical errors. YOU CAN ASK QUESTIONS OR OTHER OPINIONS TO FURTHER THE CONVERSATIONS.
Contains an APA style citation.
RESOURCES
E TEXT SLIDES CHAPTER 3 & 4 UOLOADED
Segal, E. A. (2015). Empowerment Series: Social Welfare Policy and Social Programs, Enhanced (4th ed.). Cengage Learning US. https://ccis.vitalsource.com/books/9798214342382

DISCUSSION POST 1
When going to the site, a topic that interested me was the Medicare Mental Health Access Act. I felt this act was important to be aware of due to my career path in Human Services and my strong advocation for mental health services access. The bill that I found was H.R.1173 – Medicate Mental Health Access Act which was introduced in 2017 to provide specifications in Medicare.
A representative from South Dakota, Kristi Noem is the sponsor of this bill as part of the Republican party. She was the sponsor for several bills that seemed to help people like the Pregnant Women in Custody Act, Family Savings Act, and the Overdose Prevention and Patient Safety Act (Congress.gov, 2017).
The last action taken on this bill was in March of 2017. This bill was only introduced to the House in February of 2017 but was referred elsewhere to the Subcommittees on Health and did not make its way to being a signed bill passed by the president. This referral concluded as the last action taken on the bill. I was not able to find a public law number due to the bill not being passed.
The Medicare Mental Health Access Act was created with the intention of allowing clinical psychologist to be treated the same as a physician, allowing them to both be covered under Medicare as necessary medical treatments (Congress.gov, 2017). The following link provides a summary of this bill, including the full text.
HR1173 | US Congress 2017-2018 | Medicare Mental Health Access Act | TrackBill
I was able to find the same bill on govetrack.us. There was not a lot of information on the bill in general as it did not make it very far, but this site also provides the full text, unlike the Library of Congress website. This site did suggest that the bill could have been passed as a law if it were to be a part of another bill in the future.
References
GovTrack.us. (2024). H.R. 1173 — 115th Congress: Medicare Mental Health Access Act. Retrieved from https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/115/hr1173
H.R.1173 – 115th Congress (2017-2018): Medicare Mental Health Access Act. (2017, March 2). https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/1173
Segal, E. A. (2015-05-05). Empowerment Series: Social Welfare Policy and Social Programs, Enhanced, 4th Edition. [[VitalSource Bookshelf version]]. Retrieved from vbk://9798214342382
DISCUSSION POST 2
The bill that I chose to do my discussion on is H.R.241 – Veterans Timely Access to Health Care Act. It was passed by the 11th Congress between 2013 and 2014. This bill was put into effect to provide appropriate care to our military veterans, and to establish standards of access to care for veterans seeking health care from Department of Veterans Affairs medical facilities. It limited the delay in appointment times to a maximum of 30 days. It puts the responsibility to continue to reevaluate this treatment on the Secretary of Veteran Affairs. The sponsor of the bill was Representative Dennis A. Ross. The last action taken on this bill was on May 21st, 2013, and it was introduced in the House on January 14th, 2013. According to the govtrack website, the bill died in a previous session of Congress, and it did not receive a vote. It never became a law, but the website states that “it could have become law in another bill.” 
https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/241/text?s=1&r=88
GovTrack.us. (2024). H.R. 241 — 113th Congress: Veterans Timely Access to Health Care Act. Retrieved from https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/113/hr241