2003 Interim Meeting

AMA-Medical Student Section
2003 Interim Meeting
December 4-6, 2003
Hilton Hawaiian Village
Honolulu, Hawaii

2003 Interim Meeting Recap

The MSS held its 25th Interim Meeting December 4–6 in Honolulu. Over 600 students attended the meeting, which featured sessions on obesity, alcohol, AIDS, and much more. Our keynote speaker was Michael Suk, MD, JD, MPH, a White House Fellow at the United States Department of the Interior. Dr. Suk, former Chair of the AMA Resident and Fellow Section and former Medical Student Trustee, talked about his experience as a Fellow and provided information on how medical students can pursue this opportunity.

The MSS, in association with an educational grant from Pfizer Medical Humanities Initiative, held its second Annual Research Poster Award on Friday, December 5. Nineteen abstracts were submitted and members of the AMA Council on Scientific Affairs selected “Reduction of Superficial Thermal Injury Using Cryogen Cooling During Laser-Assisted Cartilage Reshaping of Rabbit Ears In Vivo:  Pilot Study” by Lynn Chiu, a third-year medical student at UC Irvine College of Medicine. Ms. Chiu will be awarded travel expenses and registration to the 2004 Leadership program and National Advocacy Conference in Washington, DC.

The MSS is pleased to welcome into its leadership ranks Chair-Elect David Winchester, medical student at the University of South Florida College of Medicine, and Trustee-Elect Matthew Lawyer, JD, who has completed his law degree at University of Illinois-College of Law and is now a medical student at Southern Illinois University-School of Medicine. David and Matthew will begin their positions at the end of the 2004 HOD Annual Meeting in June.

We also welcome 21 elected Medical Student Regional Delegates and 21 Alternate Delegates who will serve on their respective state delegations to the AMA House of Delegates in 2003.

MSS Policy Highlights

At the 2003 Interim Meeting, the MSS Assembly considered 38 items of business, including 33 resolutions and 5 reports. The MSS focused on two important issues: the National Residency Matching Program lawsuit and medical student debt. The Assembly adopted a recommendation to officially oppose the NRMP anti-trust litigation and adopted extensive medical student debt policy on state and local advocacy, immediate legislative solutions, long-term solutions and future AMA-MSS collaborative efforts/directions. Four resolutions on student debt were subsequently transmitted to the HOD.

Another Successful “Tobacco Stinks” Event

The AMA-MSS and the AMA Alliance jointly sponsored the “Hawaii 5-K,” a 3.1 mile walk/run around Hawaii’s Magic Island on Saturday, December 6. The event kicked off at 6:30 a.m. and over 150 attendees of the Interim Meeting ran or walked the course. Everyone who finished received a T-shirt, refreshments, and a goodie bag. Proceeds from this event will go to the MSS National Service Project, “No Butts About It…Tobacco Stinks!” and the AMA Alliance’s healthy lifestyles initiative. A big “mahalo” to the many medical student and Alliance volunteers who helped make this event a success.