Elena Fuentes-Afflick, MD, MPH, Joins AAMC as Chief Scientific Officer; COVID-19 Cases Climbing Again; Global Software Outage Impacts Health Systems Nationwide; and Other Items of Interest
The AAMC welcomed Elena Fuentes-Afflick, MD, MPH, this week as she began her tenure as the association’s chief scientific officer. She previously served as professor of pediatrics at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and vice dean for the UCSF School of Medicine at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital. Dr. Fuentes-Afflick will provide leadership and vision for addressing research, science policy, and other related issues facing academic medicine, medical schools, teaching hospitals, and health systems. In her role, she will also be closely involved in the strategy and direction of CFAS, which sits within the AAMC Scientific Affairs cluster.
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During a week when the White House announced President Joe Biden was recovering from COVID-19, cases have been surging throughout the country, as evidenced by rising wastewater monitoring data and increases in hospitalizations. The Hill reported especially high numbers in California, Arkansas, Florida, Maryland, Nevada, Oregon, and Texas. Infectious disease experts continue to note that while the current variants are highly transmissible, they do not appear to cause severe illness, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continues to warn that vaccination rates to protect against the disease remain low, including among those at higher risk due to age or other health issues.
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Nearly 18 million people, 7% of United States adults, suffered from long COVID as of early last year, reported the Washington Post in coverage of a report in JAMA Data Brief. And the New York Times covered a study in the New England Journal of Medicine showing strong evidence that vaccination has a pronounced protective effect against developing the condition.
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A global computer outage affecting Microsoft platforms which grounded a significant number of global air travelers has additionally had widespread impact on major health systems, reported STAT. Cleveland Clinic, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Duke University Health System, Massachusetts General Hospital, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, among others, all announced differing degrees of limited operations, asking some patients to stay home, canceling nonurgent appointments, or limiting procedures that require anesthesia. Electronic health records systems including Epic and Cerner also have been reported to be impacted.
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As reported by The Hill, the American Medical Association (AMA) documented a 15% decrease in physician burnout in 2023 relative to a peak in 2021 during the pandemic. The finding represents the first time in four years that the metric has dipped below 50%, but physicians are still reporting that working conditions are far from ideal. Becker’s Hospital Review covered another AMA report that documented a steeper rate of decrease among new physicians over more experienced physicians.
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When Congress reduced physician pay rates under Medicare Part B by 1.7% earlier this year, after a 2% cut in physician reimbursements in 2023, about 77% of physicians have reported an impact, according to Medscape Doctors Evaluate Medicare and Medicaid Report 2024, reported Becker’s ASC Review.
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The American Hospital Association expressed concern about the proposed payment structure in the Pay PCPs Act, which seeks to improve support and pay for primary care providers, arguing that the proposed hybrid per-member-per-month and fee-for-service structure in the Physician Fee Schedule for primary care could result in payment cuts and variation depending on provider type, reported Becker’s Hospital CFO Report.
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The American Medical Group Association (AMGA) 2024 Medical Group Compensation and Productivity Survey found that primary care doctors’ median compensation only went up by 3.6% while medical specialties saw a 5% pay boost, reported Becker’s Hospital Review. "Another key finding is that primary care, which has seen strong increases in compensation over the past few years, had the lowest increases of the major specialty categories, as well as negative compensation per wRVU [work relative value units] changes. Given the primary care productivity increases, coupled with minimal compensation increases, their compensation/wRVU ratio actually decreased from past years,” said Fred Horton, MHA, president of AMGA Consulting, which produced the report.
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CNN featured insights from John Batsis, MD, a geriatric medicine specialist and associate professor of medicine at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine, on how to maintain health in old age. In related news, the Biden administration awarded $206 million to geriatric training programs earlier this month, reported Fierce Healthcare. The awards will reach 42 different universities and provider organizations across the country, with payments ranging from about $2.9 million to $5 million between recipients.
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CFAS representative Alison Holmes, MD, MPH, of Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, contributed an op-ed to Medpage Today, “No One Wins in a Medical Student Research Arms Race,” in which she describes the challenges both trainees and faculty face when research becomes more of a box to check than a meaningful activity. “Over-incentive to publish has been shown to lead to sloppiness, overly dramatic conclusions, and ‘pollution’ of the literature with faulty findings that potentially harm patients,” Dr. Holmes writes. “For a medical student with nascent research skills and a full-time core curriculum, a goal of 25 publications and presentations in the 3 years between matriculation and residency application is clearly untenable — and frankly impossible.”
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A commentary in Medscape by Washington-based internal medicine specialist Debra Glasser, MD, covered the decline of primary care internal medicine. “The potential restoration of the field will be complex and multi-layered,” she wrote. “It will require new laws, policies, residency programs, and incentives for students, including debt reduction. Administrative burdens will need to be reduced; de-corporatization and restoring healthcare leadership to those with in-depth medical training will need to be a part of the solution as well.”
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In a piece titled “Medicine Means More Than Molecules,” published in Issues in Science and Technology, Sam Gill, MPhil, president and CEO of the Doris Duke Foundation, and Sindy Escobar Alvarez, PhD, program director for medical research at the foundation, explored the changing views and approaches being adopted by the foundation to better support science that addresses pressing health problems. “We have become concerned that we have been teaching to the wrong test, that our support is reinforcing an existing system of recognition and prestige tied to circumscribed paths of scientific inquiry,” they wrote. “By supporting applicants and projects deemed most likely to draw future NIH funding, we also seemed to favor research questions that sought to tackle diseases through improved molecular understanding of underlying disease mechanisms rather than exploring interventions that might, say, prevent clinical encounters in the first place. Also apparently disfavored was research on practices that could make health care visits more effective or ways to treat disease that would result in more equitable outcomes.”
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STAT covered an array of recent studies investigating whether CAR-T therapy can itself be a contributor to secondary cancers, and if so, what the odds of that happening might be. “While the FDA is continuing to gather information, it is for now asking patients be monitored lifelong for second cancers, and for clinicians to report any suspected emergence of secondary malignancies,” the piece noted.
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The percentage of Americans who can afford and access prescription drugs and quality health care is only 55%, down six points since 2022, reported Becker’s Hospital CFO Report.
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A study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine found that a nationally representative sample of women between ages 39 and 49 chose to wait to get a mammogram until they turned 50 after learning about the pros and cons, showing that women can handle the nuance associated with the screening. NPR covered the study, noting that women in their 40s have been caught in the crossfire of a decades-long debate over whether to be screened with mammograms.
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The Department of Health and Human Services, states, and individual health systems are driving efforts to replace single-use hospital gowns and other personal protective equipment with gear that can be reused, which would be more environmentally sensitive and cost effective for the medical supply chain, reported Axios.
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Medical schools and residency programs can advance toward more efficient, effective, fair, and informed selection processes by thoughtfully applying artificial intelligence (AI). To help schools and programs leverage AI tools to streamline their operations and promote equity, the AAMC — in collaboration with a multidisciplinary technical advisory committee — developed six key principles to guide the design and use of AI-based selection systems.
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The AAMC will host a webinar on July 30 at 3 p.m. ET to explore the use of AI in medical school admissions and residency selection. Panelists in different roles from a variety of institutions will share learnings, summarize internal discussions, and detail initiatives underway locally and nationally.
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Peter Rheinstein, MD, JD, president of Severn Health Solutions, wrote an opinion piece in STAT arguing that Medicare’s drug pricing rules will delay access to new treatments.
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The AAMC has launched a new Gender Equity Portfolio designed to advance gender equity within academic medicine by addressing three key focus areas: leadership biases, engaging allies, and tackling pay inequities. The AAMC will host a webinar on July 24 to explore the newly released State of Women in Academic Medicine 2023-2024 report, including highlights of progress and areas needing further attention. Free registration is required.
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The AAMC Center for Health Justice and the AAMC peer-reviewed journal MedEdPORTAL have developed a Community-Engaged Learning Collection and call for submissions to equip educators and institutions with curricular innovations to promote community-engaged scholarship in medical education. The collection is designed to unify collaborators who are committed to augmenting the role of medical education in improving the health of communities. These published, peer-reviewed educational resources were developed, implemented, and refined at one or more institution and can be replicated or adapted for use at other institutions.
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Registration is open for the 2024 Council on Medical Student Education in Pediatrics COACH Certificate Program, taking place Sept. 16-18 in Arlington, Virginia. The program is an interactive, longitudinal course, based on the competencies of the International Federation of Coaches, that aims to give medical educators the skills and resources to effectively coach their learners and peers.
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Since 2014, over 55 adult and pediatric hospitals and health systems have participated in the AAMC Project CORE® program to implement e-consults and enhanced referral processes with the goals of enabling timelier specialty access, improving communication and coordination between primary care and specialty care providers, and increasing value for patients and the health system. The Project CORE program supports organizations in establishing a scalable, sustainable program. The program is open to health systems interested in either implementing the CORE model or optimizing an existing e-consult program. Email projectcore@aamc.org for information on how to join or to request an informational call.
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Jessica Kahn, MD, MPH, has been appointed senior associate dean for clinical and translational research and director of the Block Institute for Clinical and Translational Research at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Dr. Kahn currently serves as co-director of the Center for Clinical and Translational Science and Training and as professor of pediatrics at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine and as the founding associate chair of academic affairs and career development at Cincinnati Children's Hospital.
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John Folk, MD, EdD, has been appointed associate dean for faculty affairs at Albany Medical College. Dr. Folk previously served as associate dean for medical education, chair of the Department of Medical Education, and associate professor of medical education at Wright State University Boonshoft School of Medicine.
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Amy Althoff, MD, has been named academic chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases and HIV Medicine at the Drexel University College of Medicine. Dr. Althoff is an associate professor of medicine at DUCOM and medical director of the Partnership Comprehensive Care Practice.
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Steven Boyce, MD, has been appointed chief of the Division of Cardiac Surgery at The George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates and a professor of surgery at GW School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Dr. Boyce previously served on the faculty at Harvard Medical School and Georgetown University School of Medicine.
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Herb Garrison, MD, MPH, retired as associate dean for Graduate Medical Education at the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University after serving in the role for 11 years.
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To add insult to injury, the same outage that affected hospitals, airlines, and even the U.S. Social Security Administration brought Starbucks’ popular order-ahead system to its knees, preventing customers from sending coffee orders over their phones so they would be ready upon arrival, reported Restaurant Business. Just when you needed that iced half soy double cappuccino most.
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It may keep you up at night and it may even be addictive, but “doomscrolling” — the act of scrolling your way through dozens or hundreds of negative social media posts or news stories on your smartphone — may cause you to lose your faith in people, according to a new study published in the journal Computers in Human Behavior Reports. The researchers studied population groups in both the United States and Iran. They found that across cultures, doomscrolling “can negatively affect how we view the people and world around us.” The solution, as always, is to give your phone a rest — or yourself a rest from your phone.
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And finally, do you know the words “huppeldepup” and “dingsdabumsda”? You do … but you also don’t, by definition. A reasonable English equivalent of those two Danish and German words is “whatchamacallit” or perhaps “doodah.” These placeholder words, inserted into our conversation when we can’t put our finger on the exact term we are reaching for in our brains, have a word of their own: lethologica. The Conversation covered the phenomenon that’s painfully familiar to anyone beyond a certain age (and it’s not even an old age). Have a great weekend at your thingamajig.
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Visit the CFAS Resources page for an archive of the previous edition of CFAS News as well as our People of Academic Medicine page, which features a running list of academic promotions, appointments, and departures.
Your comments and news tips are always welcome. Please email them to Eric Weissman at eweissman@aamc.org.
Read the previous edition of CFAS News.
Eric Weissman
Senior Director, Faculty and Academic Society Engagement
AAMC
eweissman@aamc.org
www.aamc.org/cfas