President's Message

november 2023

Dear PaACC Colleagues:

My name is Ross Peterson and I am the incoming chapter President and Western Governor for the PaACC. I am honored to be serving you and the PaACC for the next 18 months. I am a non-invasive cardiologist with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center from Erie, PA. I will be working closely with our prior president and Eastern Governor, Srinath Adusumalli MD FACC, as well as our Chapter Executive, Jennifer Ray Beckman, to represent you and our organization to advance cardiovascular care for our patients and advocate for cardiovascular providers throughout the state. We will highlight how we do this though this newsletter and share interesting news going on with the ACC and the Chapter.

NEWS FROM THE ACC

As many of you may have seen, the ACC in a collaborative effort with Heart Failure Society of America, the Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions, and the Heart Rhythm Society have given notice of submitting an application to the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS) to develop an independent Board of Cardiovascular Medicine. Once approved, this new board will help cardiovascular professionals pursue a new competency based approach to continuous certification and replace the current “Maintenance of Certification” approach. Please check out CV board.org for more details. There is also a video developed by Dr. Jeffrey Kevin that can be viewed here. The process is just beginning, so for now it is important that we all continue to participate in MOC as we have been doing. If you have any comments or concerns about this new process, please reach out to me at president@pcacc.org.

PaACC ACTIVITIES

This past week, 13 of your colleagues from Pennsylvania joined over 400 cardiovascular professionals from around the country to participate in the ACC’s annual Legislative Conference. We visited a dozen Congressional and our two Senatorial Offices advocating for health policy issues that affect our patients and profession. If you have an interest in advocacy or just learning about the legislative process, this is a great way to get involved.

In September, Dr. Neerav Sheth, an interventional cardiologist and advanced imager from Paoli, PA who also serves as our state advocacy lead, participated in a Smart Hearts Coalition event in Harrisburg. The group was advocating for PA Senate Bill 375, that would require a sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) detailed emergency plan and an AED located within each school building, at all school sporting events and activities, and have adequate personnel trained for the device.

JOIN PaACC AT HEART HOUSE IN NOVEMBER CME/CEU

The Mid-Atlantic Capital Cardiology Symposium (MACCS) is a one day rapid fire format educational event with debates and panel discussions scheduled for Sunday, November 19th at Heart House in Washington. DC. It is preceded with a Fellows-in-Training Forum on Saturday that covers non-clinical competencies. This event is co-hosted with ACC Chapters from Delaware, DC, Maryland and Virginia. Registrants also are invited to attend a Kick Off Cocktail event on Saturday with guests. Agendas and registration can be found at maccscardiology.org.

CVTeam LUNCH & LEARN VIRTUAL CEU

Our CVTeam is hosting their next Educational Forum Series Topic on November 15th at 12:00 noon on “The Role of Rhythm Control in patients with Atrial Fibrillation.” This is an event over Zoom that is free to participate and provides CEU credits but you must register ahead of time here.

I am looking forward to serving and working with all of you over the next 18 months. Check out our website at www.pcacc.org, follow us on Twitter @PAChapterACC, and please reach out any time via president@pcacc.org with questions, ideas, needs or if you would like to get involved in PaACC activities.

Ross Peterson, MD, MBA, FACC

President, PaACC

Governor, Western PA 

The Pennsylvania Chapter ACC supports the American College of Cardiology’s statement of support for the Ukrainian people; see this link for the full statement.