Good spirits and bow ties at AMA delegates meeting

This year's American Medical Association House of Delegates meeting featured a renewed sense of collegiality, no noticeable net change in the number of bearded delegates, a recognition of ties between current delegates and momentous health policy events from 50 years ago, and—speaking of ties—a return of one of the more prominent bow tie-wearing delegates.

The AMA's new president, Dr. Ardis Dee Hoven, said in an interview that she felt a “good spirit” at the meeting. This was echoed by Shaan Gandhi, a fourth-year Harvard Medical School student and an alternate delegate from Massachusetts. Gandhi said he enjoyed the mix of healthcare policy discussions—ranging from support for a ban on the marketing of energy drinks to youths to delaying the implementation of the ICD-10 set of diagnosis and procedural codes. Gandhi said he definitely would attend future meetings.

It was hard to recognize the formerly bearded but now clean-shaven Dr. Melvyn Sterling, a palliative-care physician from Orange, Calif. But there was no mistaking the somewhat laid-back-but-deliberate voice of the former chairman of the AMA Council on Science and Public Health as he spoke in favor of recognizing obesity as a disease and argued that the way to deal with the “scourge” of marijuana was to legalize and regulate it. An exact count was not taken, but Sterling's beard loss was offset by the bewhiskered appearance of Dr. Reid Blackwelder, president-elect of the American Academy of Family Physicians, at the meeting.

Although he lost his bid to become AMA president, Austin, Texas-based anesthesiologist Dr. Joseph Annis recalled how this meeting marked the 50th anniversary of the inauguration of his father, Dr. Edward Annis, as AMA president. The elder Annis led the AMA's unsuccessful fight against establishing Medicare. Dr. W. Jeff Terry, former president of the Medical Association of the State of Alabama, noted at the meeting that it was 49 years ago that his cousin, then U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Luther Terry, issued the landmark Surgeon General report “Smoking and Health.”

The current surgeon general, Dr. Regina Benjamin, attended the meeting. A former AMA trustee, Benjamin spoke to delegates and noted how it was Dr. Joe Bailey who brought first brought her to the AMA House of Delegates as an intern. The bow tie-wearing population in downtown Chicago spikes during the AMA meeting, but one prominent bow tie-wearing doc was missing last year. Bailey, a rheumatologist and internist from Augusta, Ga., explained that his son had a medical emergency meeting last June that caused him to miss the 2012 annual meeting. Then his wife had medical issues that led him to miss the interim meeting in the fall.

“Those were the only two meetings I've missed in the last 30 years,” said Bailey, a dean of the House of Delegates' Southern gentlemen contingent.

Bailey said he felt good about the 2013 meeting, especially the passage of a compromise resolution refining the AMA position on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. He called it “a huge step in the right direction.”

“It's good to be going home with a positive feeling,” Bailey said. “I love the AMA and I want to support it.”

Follow Andis Robeznieks on Twitter: @MHARobeznieks