COVER STORY
NJMS PEOPLE…DO YOU KNOW ?
LEANNE J. ROBERTS
Fighting For Future Docs Meet one extraordinary student with non-stop energy and passion. BY KAYLYN KENDALL DINES
LeAnne J. Roberts
L
eAnne J. Roberts knew she had to respond when members of Congress were on the verge of slashing Medicare funds last November. If enacted, the proposed reductions would drastically impact medical residency programs and Medicare reimbursements for physicians nationwide. So, she teamed up with fellow medical students to urge lawmakers to increase Graduate Medical Education funding. According to Roberts, legislators throughout the U.S. received approximately 30,000
emails and 20,000 calls in just 36 hours. This flurry of activism occurred just two days after Roberts was named chair-elect of the American Medical Association’s Medical Student Section (AMA–MSS). She is a fourth-year student at NJMS who is pursuing a graduate degree in public health. Roberts and T.R. Eckler, the current AMA–MSS chair, a student at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, received this project from AMA headquarters. Their charge was to swiftly galvanize support from the organization’s membership of 50,000 medical students to influence public policy. Here’s why: The Congressional Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, dubbed the “super committee,” was attempting to finalize the Budget Deficit Reduction Act. Medicare, which funds Graduate Medical Education, is in jeopardy and this could contribute to the looming national shortage of physicians. “Even though the super committee failed to produce anything, I think our effort says something about future physicians. While we medical students tend to have tunnel vision and only think about our next exam or the next patient, we do have the ability to come together on an issue that we really care about,” says Roberts, who considers herself an “East Coaster” even though she was born in Sacramento, CA. Roberts will continue promoting her message in June when she succeeds Eckler for a one-year term as chair of the AMA–MSS, the nation’s largest and most influential organization of medical students. She’s held several leadership positions with the AMA since 2008, her first year in medical school. This is the second time since 2010 that a member of NJMS has been elected to a top post with the AMA. Peter W. Carmel, MD, DMedSci, an internationally recognized pediatric neurosurgeon and chair emeritus at NJMS, is currently the AMA President. Roberts refers to Carmel as one of her “top mentors.” According to Carmel, Continued on page 17
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P U L S E
WINTER/SPRING 2012
ANDREW HANENBERG
