BY CINDY BORGMEYER
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 Special constituency representatives add value and leadership to the Academy, says Telita Crosland, M.D. |
Responding to impassioned pleas to maintain a strong leadership pathway for underrepresented constituency groups in the AAFP Congress of Delegates, delegates voted Oct. 1 to adopt a new policy concerning special constituency seats in the Congress.
The policy establishes six special constituency delegate seats and six alternate seats for groups other than new physicians (those with up to seven years in practice). The New Physician Constituency will continue to hold its two delegate and two alternate seats separate from the new "combined" seats.
No more than two representatives from any one of the other special constituencies attending the annual National Conference of Special Constituencies can be selected to fill the new combined delegate and alternate seats. The newly adopted seats will sunset in 2010. The new physician slotted seats will not sunset.
The special constituency groups currently approved by the AAFP Board of Directors are gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender physicians; international medical graduates; minority physicians; new physicians; and women physicians.
"Think of this as an investment -- an investment in future leaders," Robert Garcia, M.D., of Phoenix told a reference committee Sept. 30 concerning constituency representation. Garcia is an alternate delegate from the Minority Physician Constituency.
With the sunsetting of the Women Physician Constituency slotted seats after the 2002 Congress, the number of special constituency seats dropped from six delegates and six alternates to four of each. In the 2003 Congress, those seats were evenly split between the Minority Physician and International Medical Graduate constituencies. Supporters of the move to expand the number of slotted delegate seats back to six testified that the current ration of seats doesn't allow adequate representation of the special constituencies.
"The value added to the Academy is obvious by the number of excellent leaders who have risen through these constituencies," Minority Physician Constituency delegate Telita Crosland, M.D., of Dupont, Wash., testified in the reference committee hearing. She singled out (then) AAFP Board Chair Warren Jones, M.D., of Ridgeland, Miss., and Speaker Carolyn Lopez, M.D., of Chicago as examples.
True, the Academy stands to incur some additional expense, because the AAFP covers the cost of bringing all special constituency representatives to the Congress. But, as Minority Physician Constituency alternate delegate Kim Yu, M.D., of Novi, Mich., asked, "Can you put a price on Warren Jones? Can you put a price on participation?"
Delegates also considered how to best select the Academy's delegation to the AMA House of Delegates, voting to initiate a system whereby AAFP delegates and alternate delegates to the AMA are appointed through the Board of Directors screening committee process rather than elected by the Congress of Delegates.
This process, which occurs in November, would allow more accurate estimation of the size of the AAFP's AMA delegation. Also, the Board's Executive Committee, which attends AMA meetings, could provide input on qualifications needed on the delegation at any one time.
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