1. Expand and strengthen the role and impact of state-level advocacy.
2. Standardize advocacy strategies and approach at the federal, state, and workplace level.
3. Streamline advocacy content development and delivery.
4. Identify, test, and adopt new fundraising strategies to support advocacy initiatives.
5. Create awareness around the business of emergency medicine and have difficult discussions about possibilities and protections.

Want to ramp up your advocacy awareness and input opportunities? The easiest step is to join the 911 Grassroots.

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May 2022: The educational content of ACEP’s Leadership and Advocacy Conference (LAC22), hosted in early May, was focused on protecting the individual emergency physician on the job. One of the sessions, “The Great Consolidation: What Role Can Policymakers Play in Ensuring Fairness in Health Care Markets,” provided a deeper dive into consolidation.

During that panel discussion, Rohan Pai, deputy assistant director for Mergers IV for Federal Trade Commission Bureau of Competition, talked about the FTC’s role with health care mergers by explaining,“Our main goal is try to prevent harmful mergers from occurring in the first place.” Mr. Pai said many troubling mergers often fall below the size threshold for reporting to the FTC, so the agency doesn’t hear about them until they are already done.

Mr. Pai also encouraged ACEP members to use the anonymous reporting mechanism on www.ftc.gov to alert the FTC to potentially harmful mergers in their respective communities so the FTC can consider getting involved. He said they take those messages seriously, “Talking to the people who live this day-to-day is how we build these cases.”

What’s Next?

As we put the new strategic plan into action, your voice is needed. The collective voice of ACEP’s 40,000 members is a powerful force for change. The issue of autonomy and consolidation is only one of the battles we are fighting—read more about current advocacy issues in our LAC22 recap on page 8, and learn more at acep.org/advocacy.

Remember, advocating for emergency physicians looks different for everyone. You might submit your personal testimonial about the impacts of consolidation or host a meeting with your state legislators about state licenses and physician mental health concerns. You may respond to ACEP action alerts asking your legislator to support certain legislator or give to the National Emergency Medicine Political Action Committee. Every little bit of member involvement helps ACEP move the needle on critical issues affecting emergency medicine.

Jordan Grantham is ACEP’s communications manager.