Chairs
Current SIG Co-Chairs:
Deena Berkowitz, MD, MPH
Emily Montgomery, MD
Pedro Gonzalez Jimenez, MD
The mission of the Urgent Care SIG is to support urgent care pediatricians engaged in teaching, research, advocacy, and educational scholarship and foster collaboration among academic institutions and with other professional organizations to enhance the delivery of acute care to children.
The Goals of the Urgent Care SIG are to:
- Provide a venue for networking and collaboration among pediatric urgent care providers who work in an academic setting, and those who engage in education, advocacy, research and quality improvement initiatives related to pediatric urgent care.
- Offer mentorship to support the career advancement and promotion of pediatricians practicing pediatric urgent care.
- Promote collaboration on educational materials and curricula related to pediatric acute care for residents and residency graduates.
- Partner with communities and primary care physicians to provide quality care in the urgent care setting, particularly to those most vulnerable or who experience health care barriers.
Annual Summary
Annual Summary 2023
Back in the nation's capital, the Urgent Care SIG meeting aptly focused on advocacy. Diving in, pediatric urgentologist Linh Pham, MD shared how to get involved in legislative advocacy and start local. Dr. Fraser-Doh shared her personal advocacy story and how she integrates violence prevention into her career as a pediatric emergency medicine physician. Finally, Dr. Jarvis gave advice and instruction on how to utilize advocacy toward promotion.
Beyond advocacy in pediatric urgent care, other highlights from PAS 23 included multiple presentations representing academic work in urgent care. Antibiotic stewardship continued to be a hot topic in both research and QI within the pediatric acute care settings. In total 13 poster presentations utilized urgent care data, as well as 6 oral presentations.
Getting into the flow of the tri-chair leadership of the UC SIG, one of the founding co-chairs, Amanda Montalbano, MD MPH stepped down as Emily Montgomery, MD MPHE of Children's Mercy Kansas City became our first elected officer. The APA has stepped up supporting the SIGs to provide a more equitable representation of members across leadership roles, supporting yearly elections prior to PAS.
Other exciting news from the members of the SIG included an update to the work our fellowship director team has made in getting pediatric urgent care fellowships accredited though the APA. We also have members working with the Section of Urgent Care Medicine of the AAP to collaborate on QI initiatives in urgent care. In addition, we are extremely proud of the grant-funded work on racial equity in antibiotic stewardship happening in a pediatric urgent care collaborative, including members of our SIG.
Pillars of APA: Leadership While many pediatricians practicing urgent care have academic appointments, these providers lack a “professional home” to guide career development and nurture their academic endeavors in education, advocacy, research and quality improvement science. Education Given the growing number of pediatric urgent care fellowships (four have been created since 2012, with more in development), a venue for those involved in the education of urgent care providers to communicate and collaborate is essential to ensuring cohesive educational experiences for our trainees. Research Pediatric urgent care is a novel setting for research, and research related to pediatric urgent care as has been presented at the last few PAS annual meetings. A SIG for academic pediatric urgent care provides a means to collaborate and promote health outcomes research in acute care settings. Healthcare Delivery Children seeking acute care often are treated in non-pediatric settings. Indeed, just as pediatric emergency medicine has set standards for pediatric care in all emergency settings, academic pediatric urgent care is working to identify and create benchmarking standards for quality pediatric care in the urgent care setting. Public Policy & Advocacy Pediatric urgent care is a rapidly growing field, providing access to acute care for children when the medical home is not an option and acuity does not require emergency department resources. Providing equitable access to patient and family centered care is central to the mission of pediatric urgent care scholars working as a member of the medical neighborhood.
