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Students, residents choose leaders, advocate policy
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- Resident, student congresses take on some touchy topics
Carter |
Turner |
Brown |
Laming |
Delegates to the National Congress
of Family Practice Residents and National Congress of Student Members on Aug.
9 elected the following officers to represent them in the coming year:
- members of the AAFP Board of Directors: Saria Carter, M.D., of Davie,
Fla.; Eddie Turner of Nashville, Tenn.;
- resident National Conference chair: Janine Brown, M.D., of Fairfax, Va.;
- student National Conference chair: Christie Laming of Greenville, N.C.;
- alternate delegates to the AAFP Congress of Delegates: Drew Keister,
M.D., of Waldorf, Md.; Michael King, M.D., of Lexington, Ky.; Jennifer Burger
of Portland, Ore.; Daniel Lewis of Hampton, Tenn.;
- national family medicine interest group coordinator: Gretchen Dickson
of Pittsburgh;
- representatives to the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine Board of
Directors: David Fisher, M.D., of Winston-Salem, N.C.; Amy Shafer of Portland,
Ore.;
- representative to the Association of Family Practice Residency Directors
Board of Directors: Nancy Pandhi, M.D., of Strasburg, Va.; and
- representative to the Residency Review Committee for Family Practice:
Craig Denham, M.D., of Glasgow, Ky.
Students and residents attending the conference testified on multiple issues
facing the Academy, the specialty and the nation. Here's a sampling of resolutions
considered by the two congresses, along with the source of each resolution.
"It is the responsibility of this Academy to provide information that we can use in good decision making," says Angel Foster of Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., of a student resolution concerning reproductive health education for physicians. |
The congresses asked AAFP to:
- Develop an easily accessible and comprehensive primer on quality improvement.
Delegates also asked the Academy to provide regular updates on its QI projects
and related issues; to create QI tools for new physicians entering practice;
and to work with appropriate entities to incorporate QI activities into
medical school, residency and fellowship training. (NCFPR/NCSM)
- Advocate medical liability reform through avenues other than caps on
noneconomic damages; lobby for reform to assist residencies threatened by
rising malpractice insurance rates; and embrace a comprehensive, long-term
approach to liability reform. (NCFPR/an abbreviated version was approved
on the NCSM reaffirmation calendar)
- Update the Academy's patient Web site, familydoctor.org,
to reflect AAFP policy on education about reproductive health topics by
periodically updating patient education materials on all forms of contraception.
(NCFPR/NCSM)
- Disseminate reproductive health education for physicians at the resident/student
conference, as well as at other AAFP-sponsored conferences and in appropriate
Academy publications. (NCFPR/NCSM)
- Collaborate with the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine,
Association of Family Practice Residency Directors and other organizations
to create a national family medicine mentorship program. (NCSM)
- Research the concept and quality of part-time/shared family medicine
residencies to identify a possible correlation between these programs and
the appeal of family medicine as a specialty choice. (NCSM)
- Advocate increased private and public funding to support physicians wishing
to establish urban practices for the underserved, provide easy access to
information identifying potential funding for this purpose and develop practice
management tools addressing issues specific to this practice setting. (NCSM)
- Develop an educational handout for posting on familydoctor.org that offers
nutritional and physical fitness recommendations to help combat childhood
obesity. Encourage members to download the handout, to be made available
in Spanish as well as in English, for use in educating parents during well-child
visits. (NCSM)
- Take a leadership role in ensuring school lunches provide children with
healthy food choices, promote legislation requiring healthy food alternatives
to be placed in school vending machines, and advocate mandatory physical
education at a frequency sufficient to maintain health and control weight.
(NCFPR)
- Develop and disseminate guidelines for screening obese children at risk
for developing chronic illness. (NCFPR)
- Encourage all family medicine residencies to adopt a clear, concise written
parental leave policy and provide it to residents at the time of enrollment.
Urge residencies to reconsider and revise their policies as needed to provide
a supportive environment for residents choosing to start a family. (NCFPR)
More information on resolutions considered by the congresses is scheduled
to be published on the National Conference Web site at http://www.aafp.org/conference.xml.
Check there later this fall for updates.
Photos: Cindy Borgmeyer and J. Michael Brodie/AAFP.
FP Report is published by the AAFP
News Department.
Copyright © 2003 by American Academy of Family Physicians.
