President’s Message: Enhancing Family Medicine Through Leadership Development and Education

As we near the end of another year, I hope that you and your family are doing well. We know this is a busy time for everyone, so we are taking this opportunity to share a few recent updates and enhancements that you may find beneficial as you complete your certification requirements and look to the start of a new year.

In this issue of the Phoenix, you’ll learn about new certification activities. These include new Pain Medicine and Musculoskeletal Knowledge Self-Assessment activities, a new Health Administration, Leadership, and Management Certificate of Added Qualification currently in development, and a new Performance Improvement activity with a focus on augmented intelligence and machine learning. In addition, we’re excited to release our first edition of the Family Medicine Factbook.

There are several recent leadership development announcements to recognize, including the National Academy of Medicine (NAM) 2023 James C. Puffer/ABFM Fellows, as well as the 2023 class of Pisacano Scholars – a diverse group of remarkable young physicians doing important work. And just recently, ABFM Board Chair Dr. Gerardo Moreno was elected to the National Academy of Medicine. In an interview with Drs. Bob Phillips, Lauren Hughes, and June-Ho Kim, we share more about the Essential Role of Primary Health Care for Health Security and Securing Health Conference held in Washington, DC, this summer. Approximately 150 attendees from more than 20 countries attended to share ideas on implementing fit-for-purpose primary health care, encouraging partnerships with public health, promoting global health security, and improving health equity.

As part of our Health Equity in Action series, we’ll share recent stories highlighted during Hispanic Heritage Month. These include a language concordance study developed through the ABFM Research Department with Pisacano Scholars, which analyzes the use of the Spanish language in hospital settings, and a focus on Dr. Emiliano Lemus, a family medicine resident in San Francisco serving Latine and LGBTQ patients. We are pleased to share these stories here, and we look forward to highlighting more unique stories of family physicians serving diverse communities across the country. Family physicians serve many different communities – ABFM honors both the commitment to service and leadership, as we learn from the variety of causes and communities that family physicians commit to.

Thank you for all you do.

Warren Newton, MD, MPH
President and CEO