The recent Seattle ACEP meeting demonstrated to me the rapidly expanding interest of EM residents in International Emergency Medicine (IEM), the mushrooming number of IEM fellowships, and the growing number of countries around the globe with EM residencies and substantial EM organizations.
While only a sidebar to ACEP’s main show, my time was occupied by a full and robust schedule of International Emergency Medicine meetings. Primarily held at the Sheraton rather than in the Convention Center, representatives of emergency physician organizations from about 25 countries, most of the U.S. International EM Fellowships, and the many emergency physicians involved in global emergency medicine education and humanitarian response participated.
Groups holding both educational and organizational meetings included the International Federation for Emergency Medicine (IFEM), the ACEP International Section, SAEM’s Global Emergency Medicine Academy (GEMA), CORD and EMRA’s International Fellowship Groups. It was an intense schedule; too many overlapping meetings—kind of typical of most ACEP meetings.
These activities demonstrate that this exciting area of EM offers lots of opportunities for our specialty. One of our current faculty members (Brad Dreifuss) and a UA medical school alumnus (Svetlana Resnikova—who just became “FACEP”) have taken advantage of being nominated as ACEP Ambassadors to other countries. EM residents and faculty have lots of opportunities to make a global difference. Congratulations to them and other members of our specialty who are breaking new ground and expanding the scope of global medicine.
