In my opinion, the #FMRevolution needs to learn from the Occupy Wall Street protestors. What do I mean by that? In the video above, you'll see a segment from Family Medicine Rocks Podcast #21 last week where I talk about this in detail. In brief...
My friend Kevin Bernstein, of the Future of Family Medicine Blog, released a creative little video (#FMRevoluton video) getting people fired up about Family Medicine. Ever since it's release, it has made the rounds in the Family Medicine community, with numerous postings on people's and organization's facebook pages. And, as of this blog post, there have been over 1600 views (which in the FamMed community, I think qualifies as a "viral" video).
Even after all that - So What? What does it really mean? People really like a video that says Family Medicine is cool? To me, it means people really like to feel good about Family Medicine. Does that really change anything in the world? Does that really change anything in the health care system? No.
Here is where Occupy comes into the picture. We can all agree that Occupy has a lot of frustrated feelings about their world situation. But, they are doing something about it. They are not staying home and whining about things. Now, you may not agree with what Occupy is doing, but most of #FMRevolution is sitting at home, in front of their computer, clicking "like" on facebook and hoping the world changes around them.
Now, another video was also recently released and making the rounds in the Family Medicine community. This video is with my friend Sarah Sams and was produced by the AAFP. In this video, Sarah is talking about the impending Medicare cuts at the end of this year for physicians. She gives clear and concise advise on what we can DO to address the problem. Unfortunately, as of this posting, there have been only 200 you tube views. No, it doesn't give a happy feeling at the end of it like the #FMRevolution does. But, it gives a more important message.
Sarah Sams is Turning Emotion Into Action. And, I really believe that if #FMRevolution wants to succeed in its goals, the Family Medicine community needs to stop whining and complaining about what is going on in this broken healthcare system - and they need to DO something about it. For some people, it's contacting legislators and advocating for a permanent fix in the Medicare payment system before December 31, 2011. For other people, it's educating about what Family Medicine is really about and how the Patient Centered Medical Home can help our country. For others, it's something different.
If Family Physicians cannot be advocates for our own specialty, then who will?