Most important, though: Attracting more students and house officers to HM is good for health care and patients. Hospitalists have proven their value as trusted caregivers for patients and stewards of the hospital. And more hospitalists can only help to achieve our common goal of truly transforming health care and revolutionizing patient care.
All we need to do is to connect students and house officers to our society. Fortunately, many in SHM already are working on just that.
How SHM Members are Connecting, and How You Can, Too
The Physicians in Training (PIT) Committee has been focusing on this topic for the past year. Through the leadership of Drs. Vineet “Vinny” Arora and Darlene Tad-y, PIT has developed a multistep approach to increase student and house officer involvement, including outreach, educational programs, and trainee-specific SHM offerings (e.g. a student/resident section).
Some regional chapters, such as the Boston-area chapter of SHM, have begun to provide awards to trainees, complete with money to travel to the annual meeting. I also know that the Greater Baltimore-area chapter has put on a job fair each year for the past two years. SHM, the staff, and PIT are expanding these ideas, with plans to make SHM a professional home for students and house officers alike.
But local chapters, SHM staff, and even the PIT Committee likely cannot meet the challenge to increase student and resident membership to 1,000 by HM14 alone. We will need the broader participation of the SHM membership—and that means you!
If you’re a hospitalist with teaching responsibilities, make sure your team knows that you are a hospitalist! If you have contact with residents or students, invite them to a local chapter meeting. At the very least, email them a link to SHM and the ZDoggMD video shown at HM13—they’ll love it.
Tell them that student membership is free, and the resident membership fee is the lowest it has ever been: $100 annually, one of the lowest fees for residents of a professional society. With that membership comes a world of networking, opportunities for professional growth, and the opportunity to be a part of something special.
There are more than 64,000 students and 25,000 house staff across the country. Help me connect just 999 more of them to SHM.