A leadership vacuum in our profession

I want to comment on a subject that Skip brought up on the Forum some time ago: the fact that our profession seems, at this time, to not have any sort of organization that clearly represents us and/or has a transparent agenda on where OM should be heading. He cited the abysmally attended conference hosted by the AAAOM in New Orleans and pointed out that many, if not most, of the presenters/attendees appeared to be representatives of AAAOM or other (state) organizations or vendors.

In the years since I first began practicing, I have never found a good reason to join one of our national organizations; now that there is only one, my choices have been narrowed considerably, but I’m just not interested. It’s not that I’m in any way apathetic – I’m not – but I’ve been unable to get a clear picture of exactly what agenda these groups were promoting. I had considered joining AAOM for a short time until the new CPT codes were announced in early 2005. It is my understanding that the leadership of the two national organizations, in concert with “medical acupuncturists” (!) and chiropractors, had been negotiating these changes [i]in secret[/i] and with no input from their members. The total lack of transparency, coupled with the fact that the leadership elected to be “daddy” to their members and decide what was best for everyone, convinced me to hold onto my cash and my professional affiliation for the time being.

I don’t want to contribute money to anyone unless I know what they are going to do with it. Mission statements about promoting high ideals and professionalism sound good, but there is a dearth of detailed information concerning overall agendas. Perhaps we’re supposed to take it for granted that these organizations are looking out for our interests in general – and I’m willing to assume that they are peopled for the most part by well-meaning individuals – but I require more specificity and transparency for my own comfort level, especially following the CPT code incident. I asked many of my colleagues who were members of the two previous organizations if they could explain the long- or short-term goals of their respective institutions, yet never received any substantively specific answers.

It appears that the OM leadership takes it for granted that all practitioners seek integration with allopathy, chiropractic, etc., and that all are desirous of competing for insurance dollars. They seem to assume that of course we want and deserve our place on the merry-go-round that is the failed American health care system. Their gatherings seem more like self-promoting cheerleading sessions than opportunities for creating a consensus on where we [b]all[/b] need to be focusing our attention and energy. In the nine years that I have been attending these variously sized and located seminars and gatherings, I sense a degree of stasis that is disturbing in a profession that is so potentially vibrant and fluid.

Sadly, judging from the low percentage of acupunks who join the organizations and attend the conventions, I’m in the majority here. (I suspect that membership numbers in the state organizations are much higher than the national org, but have no data to back this up.) It’s reasonable to assume that people either don’t have the necessary funds or they don’t feel they are getting a good return on their investment. I don’t think allegations of apathy apply at all to this situation; we didn’t get into the field of medicine because we’re a disinterested lot. And I don’t know too many people in [b]any[/b] field of endeavor who are unconcerned about their livelihood.

Which brings me around to the reason I think CAN is so important and why I didn’t hesitate for a second to join when the subject of membership came up. It is my hope (and belief) that, in time, the passion, transparency, compassion, humor and joy that informs the membership of this organization can help create a clear, cohesive and coherent agenda for the profession as a whole. I’m not suggesting that we need be in any way confrontational or judgmental. But a gentle infusion of strong, pure CANned Qi might be all that is necessary to move OM off of high-center.

“Politics: A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.”
---Ambrose Bierce