Policy InAction

So why would medical students - who have just about zero time on their hands - really want to get involved in policy anyway? Let's put it this way: Medicine doesn't happen in a vacuum, and people don't get or stay well because we health professional types wave our hands, drugs, and exercise regimens around them. The truth of the matter is, we realize that larger forces play a role in our patients' well-being, and we need to participate in the process at all levels in order to alter those forces. In other words, policy (legislation, rules, regulations, processes, etc) matters to peoples' health, and we need to help ensure that the best policies for people's health get enacted just the way we would want to make sure the best possible drug regimen gets prescribed for a certain condition.

Personally, I got involved in health policy because I came to see the medical field as one giant revolving door. Patients come in to the clinic, the hospital, the ER, with an "owie" they got out there in the world - diabetes, heart disease, drug addiction - and we put a band-aid on it and send them back out into the same world that hurt them in the first place. And for some reason we're suprised when they come back the worse for wear the next time. If the band-aids aren't working, maybe we need to figure out what's causing all the cuts and scrapes. There's a lot of research these days to suggest that the society we Americans enjoy and the lives we live (often of necessity) might not be so good for our health. And I'm not just talking about Big Macs.

Med students, doctors, and other allied health professionals all have a vested interest in policy because it affects their patients' health. We have all made a pledge to protect patients' health, and that means looking at the way we do things and trying to figure out how it might be hurting or helping our patients. For too long, health professionals have left the policy to the politicians, staying out of the fray. It is time we took a hard look in the mirror and asked ourselves if staying out of the arena is really what we want for ourselves or our patients.

The American Medical Student Association (AMSA) - the country's largest medical student association, and the only completely student-run association - has answered boldly in the negative. We plan to jump into the politics, using our strength to help create and advance policies that protect patients' health in areas from environmental health to health disparities to health care delivery. We're here blogging because we want others to know what we care about, what we stand for, and why it is we feel compelled to fight this fight. And maybe, just maybe, get a few of you out there to stand with us.