You don’t know who I am yet, but you will in the future.
I haven’t decided yet if I will run for the House, Senate, or the U.S. Congress. If you are a health care professional, whether it be a doctor able to change medicine, nurses, respiratory technicians, dieticians, phlebotomists, patient care technicians, janitors, and food service employees, you will want to hear this.
We can donate as much money as we want to the American Medical Association (AMA), but does this change the landscape of legislature? I am a member of the AMA, and they should read this. Do you see that PAs and APRNs run intensive care units? How can you even fault the employers? In the eyes of the law, they are similar to physicians and much cheaper. We are throwing money into this fight against this advancement of the scope of practice. But even our dollars are failing, and despite my attempts – no one cares about the importance of education.
So, really how can physicians make a difference? I believe it starts with igniting our young generation that there are issues that threaten the future of medicine. Let me repeat my statement: What is our main goal as medical providers? Is it to argue about the patient’s care, scold another provider for his decisions, or undermine another providers’ education and training? No, this would be a waste of our patients’ valuable time. I believe that at the end of the day, our goal coincides with our patients’ thoughts: “I want to get better, go home and get back to my life.” PAs and APRNs play a considerable role in the appropriate treatment in the right setting. But do our legislators know this?
We need a young, diverse, confident health care professional who can think outside of the box and make progress in D.C. for providers to clear this ambiguity.
As Jose R. Oliva proved, legislators don’t care about education as it doesn’t matter as long as it fulfills a quota. But I’m afraid I have to disagree. My wife is from Mexico, and we don’t understand why Speaker Oliva would promote an easy entry, as education in medicine is not meant to be easy. He did not even promote Hispanic education. Over half of Florida’s physician workforce is white, 17.6 percent is Hispanic, 13.2 percent is Asian, and 5.5 percent is Black. There are 692,000 Hispanic students enrolled in Florida’s K-12 schools, and promoting an easier route to ‘medical independence’ is not a Hispanic route I’ve ever heard of.
As my hard-working father-in-law exhibits, and I am sure this is what most Latinos have bestowed, Hispanics in the United States work for everything they’re given. My father-in-law brought his family to the United States in 2005, with only his education, work ethic, and love for his family.
Today, his work ethic has earned him a prominent leadership position at a major U.S. bank. This is why I genuinely believe the motion Speaker Oliva made has not only disrespected but has disgraced the Hispanic population because of the indirect notion that any individual should be handed something despite not working for it. I’ve seen the work ethic of my father-in-law. He has earned everything he currently has because his number one priority has always been making sure his family will always be cared for.
I’ve also attempted multiple times to dance to Bachata of el Rey Romeo Santos for years. But, I am still told by my Dominican Republic family friend that I am okay, but still a bit off-key. I am competent internally, but an external review from a trustworthy friend shows that I am not quite there—the same thing as Luis Miguel or Los Angeles Azules. I am adequate to prove but not quite there to the actual experts that I know what I am doing.
A doctor will be running for the legislature in the future. You will know that this individual can help all legislators in medical topics, has an open mind, and always looks out for the underrepresented.
The author is an anonymous physician.
Image credit: Shutterstock.com
