Resident and Fellow Section: 2016 AMA Annual Meeting highlights
The AMA Resident and Fellow Section (RFS) welcome reception, held Thursday was a great success. More than 150 residents, fellows and medical students attended the event. Attendees took advantage of the opportunity to network with peers, and attendees also offered guidance to medical students on their upcoming transition to residency and becoming members of the AMA-RFS.
Education sessions
On Friday David Shulkin, MD, undersecretary of health, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, discussed how the VA is influencing American medicine during the largest transformation in its history. He shared opportunities for how young p...
Source: AMA Wire - June 12, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
AMA Senior Physicians Section: 2016 AMA Annual Meeting highlights
The AMA Senior Physicians Section (SPS) sponsored a joint educational program titled “Burning Up, Burning Out or Burning Brightly.” This well-attended program featured Richard B. Gunderman, MD, PhD, Chancellor’s Professor at Indiana University.
The program was facilitated by Barbara A. Hummel, MD, chair of the AMA-SPS and president of the Wisconsin Medical Society. The program focused on strategies to reduce burnout in senior physicians and their colleagues. Participants learned strategies to use when confronted by these challenges that would help them thrive and make a difference.
The AMA-SPS Governing Council ...
Source: AMA Wire - June 12, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Digital dystopia: Developing tools that work in practice
Physicians have access to many digital tools that can enhance care delivery. But identifying the technology that makes care less efficient and building new tools that are based on physician perspectives from the start are critical to developing a digital practice environment that works for physicians and patients, AMA Executive Vice President and CEO James L. Madara, MD, said in his address at the 2016 AMA Annual Meeting.
The potential exists—changing the digital dystopia
“Today … we have really remarkable tools,” Dr. Madara said, “robotic surgery, new forms of radiation therapy, emerging biologics. And we li...
Source: AMA Wire - June 11, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Amy Farouk Source Type: news
Bright future on horizon--and we know the path to get there
Physicians live in a world of contradictions, AMA President Steven J. Stack, MD, told physicians during his address at the 2016 AMA Annual Meeting. It’s a profession of rewards and privilege amid the toll of frustration and burnout, borne of administrative hassles and bureaucratic overreach. The challenge is to persevere and lead the way for others, he said.
A common calling
“In my travels this year I have shared my belief that it is our opportunity, our obligation and our great privilege as leaders to recognize the challenges but to not allow ourselves to be consumed by them,” Dr. Stack said.
Despite the chall...
Source: AMA Wire - June 11, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Amy Farouk Source Type: news
How physicians are making EHRs interoperable
Electronic health records (EHR) have consistently caused problems for physicians due to a lack of interoperability. At the 2016 AMA Annual Meeting, physicians and health IT developers explained how physicians must lead—and are leading—the way forward.
As the transformation of the health care system under the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA) moves closer to implementation, physicians are taking initiative in making sure that EHRs work in a way that allows them to improve patient care.
Kansas is connecting physicians statewide
The vision that was established years ago for health care was a paper...
Source: AMA Wire - June 10, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
The non-hospital: Putting patients at the center of care
For Melissa Hicks, it’s not the constant pain, the fatigue and the host of other symptoms that come with her autoimmune disease that make her sick. “What makes me feel really sick is all the work I have to do because I’m a patient,” she said. “Being sick became another full-time job. … When you’re sick, you can’t do two full-time jobs.”
Burdens of the current health care environment
Melissa Hicks shares her perspective as a patient with a chronic disease.
Hicks, who suffers from Sjogren’s Syndrome, was talking to a room full of ph...
Source: AMA Wire - June 10, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Teaching students how to be part of a system should enhance care
This study’s results highlight the potential for integrating students into interprofessional care teams in a wide range of clinical sites to simultaneously add value to the health care system and enhance education,” study authors concluded.
How can students help patients, clinics?
Clinicians who participated in the study said students could work directly with patients to improve their health. Examples of these kinds of activities include:
Monitoring care plans via face-to-face meetings
Facilitating patient access to services and resources, for example medical assistance or exercise programs
Assessi...
Source: AMA Wire - June 9, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
2016 AMA Annual Meeting gets underway--follow daily updates
The nation’s physicians, residents and students are gathering June 11-15 in Chicago to weigh new AMA policy that will help advance the practice of medicine and improve the health of the nation. Members of the medical community who aren’t able to attend still can benefit from highlights of special educational sessions and follow the policymaking in daily updates.
Policy discussion
Among the dozens of issues up for discussion are such timely topics as:
Improving the safety of drinking water
Addressing the availability of addiction treatment centers
Measuring and improving access to care for patients
...
Source: AMA Wire - June 9, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
What FDA ’s new sodium guidelines could look like in practice
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With nine out of 10 U.S. adults and children consuming too much sodium, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has released draft proposed voluntary guidelines to encourage companies to significantly reduce sodium in processed and restaurant foods by 2020. Some of the recommended changes may be eye-opening for patients who don ’t closely monitor their sodium intake. < a href= " http://pluck.ama-assn.org/ver1.0/../static/images/store/2/12/92f99568-cc30-4ae8-9cff-3b81ebe8b489.Full.jpg?1 " target= " _blank " > < img src= " http://pluck.ama-assn.org/ver1.0/../static/images/store/2/12/92f99568-cc30-4ae8-9cff-3b8...
Source: AMA Wire - June 8, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
What FDA’s new sodium guidelines could look like in practice
With nine out of 10 U.S. adults and children consuming too much sodium, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has released draft proposed voluntary guidelines to encourage companies to significantly reduce sodium in processed and restaurant foods by 2020. Some of the recommended changes may be eye-opening for patients who don’t closely monitor their sodium intake.
The need to decrease sodium consumption
High sodium intake has a direct correlation to high blood pressure, which leads to heart disease and stroke—the most common causes of death in the U.S., contributing to more than 1,000 deaths per day.
“The...
Source: AMA Wire - June 8, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Physicians take to “reset room” to battle burnout
After surveying physicians and medical providers to assess the presence of burnout, one hospital in Minneapolis implemented several changes to their facility and processes to make sure the identified burnout triggers were addressed as soon as possible. In addition to scheduling and environmental transformations, a unique solution stands out—the creation of a room where physicians and medical providers can go to “reset” following a challenging or traumatic situation.
An office for work-life balance and burnout prevention
Leaders at Hennepin County Medical Center developed the Office for Professional Workli...
Source: AMA Wire - June 8, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Damaged patient-physician relationships: Ethics essay contest
The AMA Journal of Ethics® is once again accepting essays analyzing a case in medical ethics. In this year’s case, clinicians respond to a so-called “difficult” patient with a history of chronic pain and opioid use who has just had an amputation. The John Conley Ethics Essay Contest is for currently enrolled U.S. medical students, offers cash prizes and qualifies winners to publish in the journal.
Essayists are asked to respond to this question:
Is repairing a damaged patient-physician relationship an equally shared responsibility for a physician and patient, or does one person bear more responsibility?
Essays...
Source: AMA Wire - June 7, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Amy Farouk Source Type: news
The one thing most young physicians put off--but shouldn ’t
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Preparing for unanticipated accidents or illnesses is an essential activity, but few young physicians take the time to make the necessary plans. Less than 25 percent of young physicians have an updated will, power of attorney documents and end-of-life or medical directives, according to a special report by AMA Insurance. < /p > < p >
Residency can be one of the most stressful periods in physicians ...
Source: AMA Wire - June 7, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Amy Farouk Source Type: news
The one thing most young physicians put off--but shouldn’t
A recent report found that young physicians are unprepared in key ways for accidents and illnesses that could leave them disabled or worse.
Planning for the unexpected
Preparing for unanticipated accidents or illnesses is an essential activity, but few young physicians take the time to make the necessary plans. Less than 25 percent of young physicians have an updated will, power of attorney documents and end-of-life or medical directives, according to a special report by AMA Insurance.
Residency can be one of the most stressful periods in physicians’ professional lives, leaving little time for tasks that don’t re...
Source: AMA Wire - June 7, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Amy Farouk Source Type: news
By the numbers: Specialty preferences before and after med school
Do you know how many of your peers end up in the field they picked when they began medical school? Which specialties are students most likely to stick with, and which ones attract students along the way? We break down the statistics.
The odds
Chances are you will end up in a different medical specialty than the one you had picked out when you first set foot on campus.
Just 1 in 4 medical school graduates ended up in the same specialty they picked the summer before they started medical school, according to a recent report from the Association of American Medical Colleges. That statistic is based on information from 10...
Source: AMA Wire - June 7, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
