For Immediate Release:
Aug. 15, 2006
Contact: Jennifer Snyder
713-524-4267
Walking in a Doctor's Footsteps
Houston, TX (Aug. 15, 2006)… Four local community leaders experienced the rewards and trials of practicing medicine in 2006, by following physicians for a full day during the Harris County Medical Society (HCMS) Mini-Internship Program on July 26. Community leaders who affect, report on and/or make health care policies were selected to be a part of the HCMS program so a dialogue could begin with local physicians about the issues facing health care today, such as solutions to the uninsured and overcrowding of the emergency rooms.
In today's health care environment of spiraling costs, confusion, criticism, litigation, and misunderstanding, health professionals must respond to medical consumers' concerns by establishing ongoing and open communications. For the past 13 years, the HCMS Mini-Internship Program has achieved these ends by exposing the concerns of physicians through firsthand experience for interns. It also has given physicians input from a broad spectrum of community representatives.
Eric Berger, Houston Chronicle reporter and Sci Guy blog writer; Tan Kaleemullah, manager of Gateway to Care's Provider Health Network; Rebecca Suarez, KTMD-Channel 47 Telemundo TV reporter; and Jo Ann Zuniga, assistant editor of Texas Medical Center News were this year's interns. Participating physicians were: Chair Dr. John R. Potts III, and Drs. Alberto O. Barroso, Keith A. Bourgeois, A. Tomas Garcia III, William S. Gilmer, Alan P. Glombicki, Thomas S. Granchi, Nora A. Janjan, Philip A. Matorin, and Janice Zimmerman.
The Harris County Medical Society, established in 1903, is the professional society for physicians in Harris County. It is the largest county medical society in the nation, with a membership of more than 9,000 physicians and medical students. Its mission is to be the leading advocate for its member physicians, their patients and the community, in promoting the highest standards of ethical medical practice, access to quality medical care, medical education, research, and community health.
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