Stories from Texas Medicine, November 2025

Joy in the House of Medicine: New TMAF President Clifford Moy, MD, Posits Participation as a ‘Real Feel-Good Moment for Physicians’ - 02/23/2026

Clifford Moy, MD, is the new president of the Texas Medical Association Foundation (TMAF).

Alternate Paths: Will Limited Licenses Help Alleviate Texas’ Workforce Shortages? - 01/14/2026

House Bill 2038, known as the "Doctor Act," allows Texas to establish "limited" and "provisional" licenses for unmatched medical graduates and international medical graduates.

Reaching for the Stars: For Bernard A. Harris Jr., MD, NASA Was the Start of a Childhood Dream Fulfilled - 11/07/2025

Bernard A. Harris Jr., MD, an astronaut and physician who has done two spacewalks, will be the featured speaker at the opening general session of TexMed, the Texas Medical Association’s annual conference, convening April 16-18, 2026. He’s titled his speech “An Astronaut’s Perspective: The Future of Medicine and Beyond.”

Covering Distances: Physicians, Lawmakers, Med Schools Look to Improve Rural Patient Access to Care - 11/07/2025

Texas legislators are taking notice of the dearth of physician care in rural counties with solutions, medical schools are gaining ground with successful rural-specific training tracks, with TMA all the while pushing for further steps to assuage rural health care shortages in Texas.

Medicaid Mindfulness: New Texas Law Raises Certain Violations to Same Level as Intentional Fraud - 11/07/2025

Senate Bill 1038 provides a key state agency with a new array of penalties, signaling the state’s focus on safeguarding Medicaid spending. In the process, however, it has elevated potential penalties for unknowingly violating Medicaid program rules to the same level as those for intentional fraud.