Friday, February 26, 2016

Presidents' Council

In January, I had the pleasure of attending the AOA’s Presidents’ Council meeting that took place from January 14 to 16 in Albuquerque, New Mexico with POA President-Elect Dr. Steven Eiss and POA Executive Director Dr. Charles Stuckey.
The purpose of this annual meeting is for the leadership of every state to exchange ideas and to learn from one another in order to effectively serve their respective state associations. Besides state leaders, there were also AOA committee chairs and members of the AOA Board of Directors in attendance.

Over the course of one and a half days, sessions on membership, non-dues income, advocacy, third party issues, how to run an effective meeting, working with the Board, and more were offered for attendees. These sessions alone would have been enough to consider the meeting a worthwhile endeavor; however, the POA was once again singled out as a state with a cutting edge member program. I am referring to the Pennsylvania Diabetic Eye Health Alliance (PDEHA). On Saturday morning, there was a session devoted to State Diabetes Initiatives and, besides the POA, only one other state, North Carolina, was asked to report on their program. Dr. Eiss gave a presentation before the entire group about the PDEHA and how POA members have benefited from this program. Specifically because of this program, Geisinger Health Plan reached out to our association and asked for our members’ help in providing comprehensive eye exams for their patients who are diabetic. You can watch Dr. Eiss’ presentation here: https://youtu.be/tnF-sK3JC5g

If for some reason you are not familiar with this member only program, please go to the POA’s website at poaeyes.org and click on the link in the section for the Pennsylvania Diabetic Eye Health Alliance. You can learn all about the program and sign up to participate right on the website. The more doctors who sign up, the stronger the program will be. The more representation we have across the state, the greater the ability we will have to work with other third-party payers in collaborative efforts to provide care to the diabetic patient.

I want to take this opportunity to remind everyone that as licensed health care professionals in Pennsylvania, we are now required to obtain two hours of State Board-approved continuing education in child abuse recognition and reporting requirements as a condition of our license renewal, known as ACT 31. If you have not fulfilled this requirement yet, the POA is again offering you the opportunity on Saturday, March 12 at our 2016 Spring Contact Lens Symposium, which will be held at the Toftrees Resort in State College. There is still time to sign up. Please also check out the great contact lens education that will be provided on Sunday, March 13.

The POA Board of Directors and I look forward to seeing you soon at a local society meeting or continuing education event. Please mark your calendars for the POA Annual Congress which will take place May 13 to 15 at the Radisson Hotel in Camp Hill. This is “the members’ meeting,” when the House of Delegates will convene to conduct the business of our association. Please urge your local society representatives to attend so that your voice may be heard. Your local society participation is vital to ensure a strong and united POA!

Sincerely,






Mark M. Margolies
Markod59@gmail.com