Research Presentations Highlights

The Inaugural PIT Leadership Conference will highlight 98 poster and oral presentations over 7 sessions by physicians-in-training.

Conference Speaker Highlights

Participants of the inaugural PIT conference will be hearing from five keynote speakers on topics relevant to physicians-in-training:

Advocacy 101: A Primer for Practitioners
Dr. Christopher R Morris
Private Practice, Arthritis Associates
Southern Medical Association President, 2021
Kingsport, TN

Residents and medical students learn a mountain of scientific facts during medical school and residency; unfortunately most get little on factors that will affect them once they have completed their graduate medical education. This session will review the effects that activities in Washington and the state capitals have on the practice of medicine.  Another mysterious aspect of practicing medicine are insurance types and issues; a review of such foreign phrases such as MIPS, MACRA and the different types of medicare will help take the mystery of these components that are part of every-day medical practice and will be addressed.  Finally, the importance of being an “active advocate” for our patients, our practices and our profession will be presented.

Medical Research as a Physician-in-Training
Christopher D. Jackson, MD, FSSCI
Associate Program Director for Curriculum and Education
Assistant Clerkship Director for Internal Medicine
The University of Tennessee Health Science Center
Center for Health System Improvement
Memphis, TN

Dr. Christopher Jackson will provide guidance about finding research projects that are doable during training, examples of such projects, and the formula for starting and finishing projects. By the end of this session, attendees should be able to identify various opportunities for research/scholarship from your daily work, implement the five step formula that can help you turn any project into a scholarship, and address common pitfalls that come up with research projects during training.

How to Prepare a Manuscript for Publication
Jennifer Price, MA
Education Manager/Managing Editor, Southern Medical Journal
Birmingham, AL

Medical research, clinical studies, and knowledge sharing through scientific publications are all foundational to the profession of medicine. Preparing scientific manuscripts properly is a foundational capability for medical students and resident physicians. In particular, the Southern Medical Journal is a multidisciplinary journal which strives to provide a format for sharing of clinical information across specialties with the goal of excellence in patient care. Properly preparing a manuscript for submission to a medical journal is both an art and a science, and many manuscripts fail to meet the standards set forward by a specific journal. The goal of this activity is to enhance the knowledge of the attendees in manuscript preparation, and to provide resources for that goal.

Pharmaceutical Benefits Managers (PBMs) - The Multi-billion Dollar Industry that Sits Between Patients and Physicians
Madelaine A. Feldman, MD, FACR
Private Practice, The Rheumatology Group
Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine
Tulane University School of Medicine
New Orleans, LA

Pharmaceutical benefit managers (PBMs) are playing an increasingly important role in establishing access to pharmaceutical products for patients. PBMs set retail prices for pharmaceutical products, negotiate "rebates" from manufacturers based on total sales volume of products, and achieve several types of postsale price concessions and payments from pharmacies. All of these activities describe a complex flow of funds that has not been transparent to clinicians or to patients. In this informative presentation, Dr. Feldman provides awareness about the industry of Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs), including formulary construction and utilization management tools, how PBMs impact actual cost to employers and/or patients, legislation which might impact PBMs and drug prices for patients, and insight about the withdrawn rebate rule. At the conclusion of the session, learners should be better informed about the role that PBMs play in the process of negotiating payment rates for a large share of prescription drugs distributed in the U.S.

Imaging Fundamentals
Jason Rothschild, MD
Attending Physician, Musculoskeletal and General Radiology
Instructor of Radiology
Eastern Virginia Medical School
Virginia Beach, VA

In this session, we will review a multimodality approach to address common problems in medical imaging, including pulmonary embolism, acute appendicitis, and osteomyelitis.