A view of the mountains and sculpture park near the Denver Convention Center, site of this year’s annual meeting
After a whirlwind APHA 2016 in Denver, we are back with a quick summary of the meeting and Medical Care Section events. There were about 11,600 conference registrants overall. We were impressed with the great turnout for Medical Care Section events. We had standing room only for the Special Invited Panel Session: The Childhood Roots of Health Inequity, a testament to the broad applicability of the presented work. Our special double session with the Mental Health Section, Medicating Children’s Behavior, provoked some great discussion among attendees.
Thank you to everyone who attended, presented, moderated, and organized! We had good turnout at business meetings as well, and several of our committees had vibrant sessions with lots of interested people attending.
For the first time this year, we used Twitter to let people know about some of our events in real time. We’ve collected some of those tweets here. Be sure to follow @medcarebloggers for all the updates!
We <3 Students
The Student Mentoring Session, sponsored by our section every year, was a great success — more than 66 students and 13 mentors attended. This year’s informal format allowed for a lot of discussion among mentors and students. And this year’s student award session featured four fantastic presentations! Look for a future blog post by one of our student attendees, and check us out on Facebook if you’re interested in seeing more photos!
Congratulations to our 2016-17 Medical Care Advocacy Interns, R. Henry Olaisen and Sonia Lee. The internship program is new this year, and we look forward to working with these and future students who are interested in getting more involved.
Honored Speakers
Dr. Christine Sinsky, Vice President for Professional Satisfaction at the American Medical Association and practicing Internist in Dubuque Iowa at the Medical Associates Clinic and Health Plans, received the Donabedian Award for Healthcare Quality. As described by Dr. Gordon Schiff, who organizes the session every year, “Dr. Sinsky has worked tirelessly to help maintain and restore the joy in caring for patients that, as she noted, is being rapidly eroded by a host of inefficiencies and changes in medical practice. In particular, she has worked to critique and improve the ways that electronic medical records, as currently designed and implemented, are creating inefficiencies and obstacles to high quality teamwork and care.”
Tuesday night, we heard from Dr. Irene Aguilar, a Colorado State Senator, during our An Evening with… session about her signature initiative, Colorado Care, an amendment that could lead to universal health coverage within the state. Viseltear Award Winner Michael Udell discussed the historical context of race described in his book, “Race Unmasked.” Of course, we loved getting to catch up with colleagues and enjoy tasty appetizers as well!
Section Leadership Announcements
Renee Carter‘s term as Chair is ending. Thank you, Renee, for all of your amazing work on behalf of the section! It has been a pleasure to watch the section grow under your leadership. As Immediate Past Chair, Renee will still be involved in section leadership.
Jim Wohlleb is our new section Chair. And our own Jessica Williams is now serving as Chair-Elect.
Tina Tseng is stepping down as secretary. Thank you, Tina, for all of your contributions! Hung Le is our new Secretary.
Thank you again to all of our section members and participants in this year’s APHA Annual Meeting. Are you looking to be more involved in the section? Please visit our page for suggestions. We hope to see you next year in Atlanta!
Lisa M. Lines