The Portrait of a Multidisciplinary Group
The fields of cardiovascular and pulmonary rehabilitation and medicine are filled with professional associations'but none are quite like AACVPR. No other organization has the focus of AACVPR'a multidisciplinary focus of advancing the science and practice of cardiovascular and pulmonary rehabilitation. The annual meeting of AACVPR also is unique, offering educational, networking, and advocacy opportunities for this distinct multidisciplinary audience.
AACVPR President, Randy Thomas, MD, FAACVPR, and President Elect, Bonnie Sanderson, RN, PhD, FAACVPR, recently took time to share why this distinguishing fact is so powerful and impactful to professionals within the cardiovascular and pulmonary rehabilitation fields.
A Culture of Passion
How is AACVPR important to you and your career?
Randy: To me, AACVPR represents an opportunity to interact with a group of professionals who are passionate about high-quality patient care, learn from the leaders in the field, and contribute to the advancement of the field in meaningful ways. It's rare you will find an organization with such a strong focus on patients, but our unique status as a multidisciplinary group helps us do just that.
How does being part of a multidisciplinary group such as AACVPR benefit you and your program? Your students? Your institution?
Bonnie: I entered AACVPR as a nurse in a cardiovascular rehabilitation program, but evolved into an interdisciplinary health professional with a passion to improve individual health and healthcare. As a new nurse in rehabilitation, I felt comfortable with the care and teaching about cardiovascular disease, but recognized my lack of skills and knowledge in exercise therapy. I reached out to AACVPR to fill the gaps in my knowledge and experience and was astounded at the generosity and sharing of knowledge and expertise from my multidisciplinary colleagues. We hear about the need for more interdisciplinary care'AACVPR is the role model with years of practice of making it work!!
How can AACVPR help cardiologists and pulmonologists strengthen their practice and their focus on cardiovascular and pulmonary rehabilitation?
Randy: The resources of AACVPR are essential to physicians who practice cardiology, pulmonology, or primary care medicine, and have an interest in providing the most up-to-date preventive and rehabilitative care to their patients with heart or lung disease. The educational materials, continuing education opportunities, and clinical tools available through AACVPR are unique resources for physicians'resources that are not found anywhere else in the healthcare field today.
This year AACVPR celebrates its 25th anniversary. What do you hold as some of its top accomplishments for providers and patients of cardiovascular and pulmonary rehabilitation? What does the future hold for the organization and its members?
Randy: Over the 25 years of its existence, AACVPR has helped take cardiovascular and pulmonary rehabilitation from their infancy to early adulthood by helping to stimulate advances in the science, practice, and policies of these fields.
One of the most notable AACVPR accomplishments over the past decade has been to establish a strong voice in our local and national legislatures. We have helped educate and guide our local and national legislators as they contemplate the complexities of healthcare'particularly as it relates to preventive and rehabilitative care for our patients.
The future is very bright for the fields of cardiovascular and pulmonary rehabilitation, and for AACVPR as well. The importance and benefits of preventive and rehabilitative care are emerging into mainstream medicine, more now than ever before. We have the opportunity to help move the profession forward in significant and very specific ways. The more we as an organization grow, the more we can continue to impact the field.
The 25th AACVPR Annual Meeting is coming up in October. What can attendees expect to take away from the 2010 Annual Meeting?
Randy: Expect to walk away with validation'a strong reminder as to why you are in this field of service. Cardiovascular and pulmonary rehabilitation is often seen as a "nice to have," but not a "need to have." We're working to change that mindset but it takes time. The Annual Meeting is an opportunity to be around passionate people who provide food for the brain and energy for the soul to do what we do best - "Saving lives by helping to heal hearts, lungs, and people."