Mark H. Getelman, M.D. has completed his term as President of the Arthroscopy Association of North America (AANA), telling OTW, “Being President during AANA’s 40th Anniversary year was incredibly rewarding and raising over $4 million and creating a legacy 40th Anniversary Monograph was very special.
Mark Getelman, M.D. Wraps Up AANA Presidency, Highlights Diversity
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Being the President of AANA was the first American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgery Board of Specialty society to share a Specialty Day Program with the Ruth Jackson Orthopaedic Society and then parlaying that into the FutureScope Diversity Program moving forward are absolute highlights as well.”
Dr. Getelman is enthused about the organization’s new program for medical students. The goal is to expose females and underrepresented persons in medicine to arthroscopy and orthopedics as a career.
Funding that program is a $1 million grant from DePuy Synthes Mitek Sports Medicine and Dr. Getelman discussed with OTW how that grant will be used to build awareness of arthroscopy among a broad range of medical students. “The grant will be used to develop and market the program to the medical students and then cover the expenses of the actual courses themselves where hands on training and education will be offered including basic arthroscopic and orthopedic skills using the Fundamentals of Arthroscopy Surgery Training and anatomically correct and Sawbones models for arthroscopy training and fracture care and there will be live cadaveric surgical demonstrations to engage the students.”
Dr. Getelman also explained to OTW how the program builds diversity in orthopedics. “It has been shown that these subgroups do not often choose orthopedics as they are not exposed early on and often find that there are few mentors who they can relate too. It will take time to change the environment at their individual institutions, but we plan to have a diverse faculty at these courses with faculty of different ethnicities and several female faculty who will best relate to the attendees.”
“What,” OTW asked Getelman, “would be your personal message to females and underrepresented minorities who are hesitant about orthopedics?”
“I believe that orthopedic surgery is the best profession in medicine, and it will only improve as we recruit a more diverse group of doctors. I only ask that they give us a fair look and I know many will be hooked. Statistically, we are many of the happiest physicians across all specialties and have high job satisfaction as we typically have happy and healthy patients, and we can make a significant improvement in their quality of life. The stereotypes of the past need to change and I am excited for the future.”
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This is a fascinating development. In my practice we've seen similar outcomes with the revised protocol. The key differentiator seems to be patient selection criteria. Has anyone else noticed the correlation with BMI thresholds?
Great point. I'd push back slightly on the conclusion, the sample size in the cited study is too small to draw population-level inferences. That said, the directional signal is compelling and worth a larger RCT.
We implemented a similar approach last year. Early results are promising but we're still gathering 12-month follow-up data. Happy to share our protocol if anyone is interested.
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