“In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.”
– Albert Einstein
THE MEDICAL REGULATION COMMUNITY is often confronted with difficulty, particularly over the course of the past few years during the COVID-19 pandemic. These difficulties can take many different forms…keeping up with the paper trail of CMEs completed…assuring cognitive, mental, and physical competence of the physician workforce…achieving desirable scores on high-stakes exams…achieving diversity, equity, and inclusion among medical regulators. Each of the contributors in this issue of JMR has been confronted with these kinds of difficulties and each has used them as an opportunity to better the medical regulation community.
In “Navigating a High-Stakes Assessment in Medical School: Students’ Lived Experiences During a Stressful Period of Preparation” (page 7), a group of authors led by Miguel Paniagua at National Board of Medical Examiners describe their qualitative study designed to better understand the challenges and stressors associated with students’ preparation for successful completion of licensure assessments.
As Sarvam TerKonda notes in his Message from the FSMB Chair (page 5), the pandemic has exposed a healthcare workforce in crisis. In her article titled “Physicians and Cognitive Decline: A Challenge for State Medical Boards” (page 19), Sharona Hoffman discusses the challenges associated with this difficult aspect of the healthcare workforce crisis and asks whether state medical boards should have an opportunity to play a role to play in identifying clinicians with cognitive decline.
In the third article in the JMR series on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Medical Regulation titled “Supporting Health Equity through a Focus on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Medical Regulation: The FSMB’s Initial Steps on a Critical Journey” (page 29), Jeffrey Carter provides an update on the important work of the FSMB Workgroup on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Medical Regulation and Patient Care as it continues to strive to identify opportunities for understanding and addressing systemic racism, implicit bias, and health inequity in medical regulation and patient care.
As a response to the challenges created by the remote work environment caused by the pandemic, the Medical Board of California took the opportunity to move from paper-based certification and CME systems to more robust online portals. In an article titled “Medical Board of California Adapts to an Ever-Changing Remote Environment” (page 32), Emmalee Ross outlines the steps taken by the Board to streamline processes.
