Monday, March 16, 2009

AMNews: March 16, 2009. White House summit takes 1st step in health system reform discussion ... American Medical News

AMNews: March 16, 2009. White House summit takes 1st step in health system reform discussion ... American Medical News:


AMNews had a more complete list of physicians in attendance than I did in an earlier post about the Summit:


"President Obama invited more than 100 people to a White House summit on health system reform on March 5, including the following physicians.
Rep. Michael Burgess, MD (R, Texas)
Ted Epperly, MD, American Academy of Family Physicians president
Oliver Fein, MD, Physicians for a National Health Plan director
Jeffrey P. Harris, MD, American College of Physicians president
Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, MD, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation president and CEO
Nancy H. Nielsen, MD, PhD, American Medical Association president
Irwin E. Redlener, MD, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health professor
Elena V. Rios, MD, MSPH, Hispanic Medical Assn. president
Michael Salem, MD, National Jewish Health hospital system president
Henry E. Simmons, MD, MPH, National Coalition on Health Care president
David T. Tayloe Jr., MD, American Academy of Pediatrics president
Ho Luong Tran, MD, MPH, Asian and Pacific Islander American Health Forum president and CEO
W. Douglas Weaver, MD, American College of Cardiology president"



For my own edification, I did some research on membership numbers:
First, total number of ohysicians in US about 800K.

American College of Physicians (Internists and Medical Specialists) 126,000 members
American Academy of Family Physicians 94,000 members
American Academy of Pediatrics 60,000 members

Amercian College of Cardiology 36,000 members

AMA 240,000 including students and residents (free membership) and retired.
--- maybe 140,000 practicing physicians (Approximately 20 % or less of all physicians)


Hispanic Medical Association 36,000 members


Others:

American College of Surgeons 76,000 members


American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists 52,000 members

American Society of Anesthesiology 43,000 members

American Psychiatric Association 38,000 members

American College of Radiology 32,000 members

American College of Emergency Physicians 27,000 members

American Academy of Dermatology 16,000 members

American Academy of Ophthalmology 7,000 members

American Orthopaedic Association (AOA) 1,500 members


These numbers are from the organizations own websites, except for the AMA data which is from Wikipedia - I actually have the actual data from the membership committee buried in my office somewhere, and if I can find it, I'll post it.

In any case, some of the numbers include medical students, residents and fellows, and international members. But at least a rough guide, suggesting that there really is no single big gorilla, but I know some small groups put their money where their mouths are and have outsized political clout...

Some State Membership numbers, from their web sites:

California Medical Association 35,000

Texas Medical Society 43,000

Medical Society of New York 30,000

Florida Medical Association 19,000

Illinois State Medical Society _____

Pennsylvania Medical Society 20,000

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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Cost containment vs. expanding coverage? A very important piece of health care reform should be a mandate for all with sufficient income to purchase health insurance. We need to have everyone in the system in order to control the costs. Health care costs will not be affordable in a health care system where mainly the chronically ill people are the ones signing up. Expanding coverage will help contain costs. http://www.BenefitStudio.com