Get involved in politics and make your voice heard

By Edward J. Volpintesta, MD, AMNews contributor. June 10, 2002.

As a member of my county medical society, its former board chair and a delegate to our state association, I have often been struck by what happens when physicians meet to discuss major issues confronting medicine. The diversity of opinion that flows forth energizes me because it forces me to think.

It can be frustrating to be in the midst of the dissonance of intelligent and articulate individuals, each straining to be heard and trying to be persuasive. However, there is a common thread -- the need for physicians to protect medicine's rightful role in society and the importance of them to be involved in public life.

Unfortunately, not often enough are such fine sentiments expressed in the place they could do some good -- the world outside those meeting rooms. Physicians, in much greater numbers than we witness today, must become willing to take their message into the public arena and fight for what they know is right.

Given the political climate that most doctors work in, it is easy to conclude that medicine's destiny is completely in the hands of nonphysicians. The time required to make a living in medicine is extraordinary. The toll from trying to balance patients' needs while complying with health insurers' restrictions makes it easy to acquiesce to those forces that seemingly are intent on destroying medicine's humanitarian principles.

Rationalizing that insurance companies have too much lobbying power and money is a cop-out. Lawyers, HMO executives and the others vying to control health care are no more deserving to be heard or held in higher esteem than doctors. [...]