My View on the Value of Family Medicine
I speak for the Value of Family Medicine, What is it to our patients – to the American health care system - to ourselves? Have we lost value? If so, how and why? How do we put forward the value of Family Medicine?
I see value in family medicine specialists who continue to go above and beyond to make sure that their patients have good outcomes - who take the patient with undifferentiated complaints and make sense of the situation – who take the responsibility over the life of the patient as their problems evolve, resolve and develop into new issues - who are the ones that the family goes to for advice and who are the ones who will be there when all the others are done and have signed off.
The value of family medicine cries for changes in our system - changes that reward comprehensiveness as well as complexity - changes that recognize that family medicine specialists treat problems with better efficiency - changes that pay for the coordination, documentation and implementation of comprehensive and continuing plans of management for patients with acute and chronic needs at their true value.
We have begun - steps have been taken by Academy leadership but the journey will be long and the effort intense - the battles will be tough and the losses frustrating - but we need to succeed - for the patients who rely on us and the families who need us.
We need to join the upcoming change as a unified body - we need to bring our brothers and sisters out in a stronger, more visible force - we need to be proactive. We need to support the Board, the PAC, and our students and residents. We must participate with our local, state and national political systems as they and we work through the change.
I bring experience in Family Medicine education, administration, and practice – in state and national activities as well as skills in negotiation, consensus building, and contract development. Been there - done that - want to do more - willing to do more - able to do more.
Cowardice asks the question, 'Is it safe?' Expediency asks the question, 'Is it politic?' But conscience asks the question, 'Is it right?' And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but because conscience tells one it is right.” - Martin Luther King, Jr.
I see value in family medicine specialists who continue to go above and beyond to make sure that their patients have good outcomes - who take the patient with undifferentiated complaints and make sense of the situation – who take the responsibility over the life of the patient as their problems evolve, resolve and develop into new issues - who are the ones that the family goes to for advice and who are the ones who will be there when all the others are done and have signed off.
The value of family medicine cries for changes in our system - changes that reward comprehensiveness as well as complexity - changes that recognize that family medicine specialists treat problems with better efficiency - changes that pay for the coordination, documentation and implementation of comprehensive and continuing plans of management for patients with acute and chronic needs at their true value.
We have begun - steps have been taken by Academy leadership but the journey will be long and the effort intense - the battles will be tough and the losses frustrating - but we need to succeed - for the patients who rely on us and the families who need us.
We need to join the upcoming change as a unified body - we need to bring our brothers and sisters out in a stronger, more visible force - we need to be proactive. We need to support the Board, the PAC, and our students and residents. We must participate with our local, state and national political systems as they and we work through the change.
I bring experience in Family Medicine education, administration, and practice – in state and national activities as well as skills in negotiation, consensus building, and contract development. Been there - done that - want to do more - willing to do more - able to do more.
Cowardice asks the question, 'Is it safe?' Expediency asks the question, 'Is it politic?' But conscience asks the question, 'Is it right?' And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but because conscience tells one it is right.” - Martin Luther King, Jr.
posted by George W. Shannon, MD at
11:07 AM
0 Comments
