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AAMC Reporter: December 2005
Annual Meeting Calls on Members to Move 'Beyond Boundaries'Underscoring the growing globalization of medical education and health care, speakers at the AAMC's 116th annual meeting called on association members to move "beyond boundaries" and confront an array of challenges in the world and in their work. AAMC President Jordan J. Cohen, M.D., urged participants not only to consider academic medicine's international outreach, but also to think "beyond our traditional comfort zone in all areas of our endeavors." The six-day meeting, held in Washington, attracted a record 3,658 registrants. In the keynote address, former Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright spoke of her encounters with atrocities in Africa and counseled medical schools and teaching hospitals to honor basic American values in their work. Demanding an end to what she labeled a "poisonous political landscape" in Washington, Albright called for a bipartisan fight against AIDS and other diseases throughout the world. U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Michael O. Leavitt stressed the need to prepare for a potential avian flu pandemic. "Think of the world right now as a dry forest before a fire," he said. "It only takes a spark. If you're there when the spark ignites, you can put it out right then with your foot." Leavitt said efforts were needed to "contain the disease abroad," but he added: "Primarily we must prepare to fight it at home. We must be in a state of readiness." David J. Brailer, M.D., the Bush administration's national coordinator for health information technology, told the meeting that the future of digital medicine required leadership from academic medicine "to achieve its potential in teaching, patient care, and research." In an address titled "Beyond Paper," Brailer argued that medical centers, in turn, "really need digital medicine to be able to be part of the future of where health care is going." Brailer maintained that information technology was still not being applied widely enough in health care. But he said that when doctors take advantage of computers, electronic records, and other state-of-the-art digital technology, they are actually using clinical tools that improve therapies and medical outcomes. Cohen, who will step down next June after 12 years as head of the association, devoted his final annual meeting address to "the work ahead" for academic medicine. He said a "strong AAMC voice" will be needed to address several major goals: increasing the medical profession's racial and ethnic diversity; leading a transformation of the nation's "outmoded" health care system; strengthening the continuum of medical education; protecting the integrity of medical research and ensuring the safety of human subjects; and expanding the capacity of schools accredited by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education to cope with a coming shortage of physicians. Cohen added another challenge, which he said was arguably the most important one: to ensure that physicians "hold fast to what they must be to fulfill their oath as professionals." Patients' legitimate needs and expectations can be fully served, he declared, "only if physicians consistently act on their own volition—following their deep-seated moral compass—to subordinate their self interest in deference to their patients' best interest." "The learning environments in which our students acquire their identities as physicians are too often failing to properly calibrate their professional compass," Cohen observed. He concluded that while medical educators "do an excellent job" of preparing students to know and do what patients need, they must do a better job of modeling "what the physician must be." N. Lynn Eckhert, M.D., Dr.PH, director of academic programs at Harvard Medical International and the outgoing AAMC chair, spoke at a leadership forum about American medical schools' growing commitment to international programs and advocated creating a global academic medicine corps. She said such an effort would help ensure that the next generation of physicians became "informed health care leaders who take on the global burden of disease." Thomas M. Priselac, M.P.H., president and chief executive officer of Cedars-Sinai Health System, succeeds Eckhert as the AAMC chair in 2005-06. Along with plenary sessions and smaller group discussions on a wide range of topics, the annual meeting featured a special general session, "No Calm After the Storm," about experiences in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The meeting also offered a recruitment fair for minority students interested in medical and other health-related careers. The fair drew more than 500 high school and college students to exhibits by 134 medical schools and related groups. Awards presented in connection with the meeting were:
For more information about the annual meeting—including links to Webcasts and ordering audio tapes—visit the AAMC meetings site. |
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