Thanksgiving is a week early this year, which means many Christmas decorations are already up, and the Black Friday sales have started that much sooner. While I am not going to enter into the debate of when to put the holiday decorations out, this year we have that many fewer days to reflect on Thanksgiving and what it means to us.
While the essence of Thanksgiving is time and fellowship with friends and family, the holiday also serves as a celebration of the harvest, a time to reap the fruits of seeds which were planted months ago. Our KMA has sown many seeds over the course of the past year, and is now seeing some of those seeds grow. Several weeks ago, KMA hosted a roundtable with nine Kentucky specialty societies. Leadership of those specialty societies shared the difficulties they face in their everyday practices, most notably the difficulties with prior authorization and scope of practice. Over the course of the day, it became clear that the issues facing our specialists are the same issues facing primary care physicians and echoed the results of a member survey KMA conducted last year. The meeting helped to reinforce the importance of our advocacy efforts on behalf of all physicians and all of our patients.
This fall, I was also fortunate enough to be able to attend both the Indiana State Medical Association and the Medical Society of Virginia annual meetings. I was able to meet leadership in both organizations, and sit in on their resolution making processes. Despite the vastly different political landscapes in both states, the debate on resolutions was fairly similar to KMA’s recent meetings in content, discussion, and eventual policy. Hopefully, I was able to plant some seeds which will grow improved relationships with our fellow medical societies, and I also hope I was able to bring some seeds home to Kentucky to plant to improve our annual meeting, our advocacy, and what we can do for our patients.
The Kentucky Medical Association can only grow with your support. Your membership plays a central role in our ability to advocate both for you and your patients. With a strong membership, we will be able to do that much more, so please renew your membership for 2024. I am thankful for both your membership and the honor of representing you as we strive to make Kentucky a better place for us to practice and a healthier place for our citizens to live.
