Candidates for ACEP Board of Directors responded to this prompt:

What innovative strategies would you use to recruit and retain membership?

Jennifer J. Casaleto, MD, FACEP

(North Carolina)

Current Professional Positions: Emergency Medicine Physician, CirrusMD and Mid-Atlantic Emergency Medical Associates (MEMA); Adjunct Clinical Faculty Physician, Atrium Health’s Carolinas Medical Center

Internships and Residency: Emergency Medicine Residency, Carolinas Medical Center (2003)

Medical Degree: MD, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine (2000)

Response

Similar to most member organizations, ACEP experienced membership decline associated with the COVID pandemic. However, unlike 80 percent of U.S. membership organizations, whose membership challenges were related to the cancellation of their annual meeting and a lack of organizational activity, ACEP brought our emergency physician community together with ACEP Unconventional and continued to support emergency physician practice through efforts such as facilitating information-sharing via engagED, developing the Field Guide to COVID-19, advocating for our safety lobbying Congress for PPE, working with the TJC to support physicians wearing their own PPE, and partnering with Amazon to get institution-level access for ACEP members. While ACEP was doing what EPs do best, identifying and caring for the most emergent member needs, ACEP wasn’t doing what the one quarter of U.S. member associations who saw membership growth during this time were doing … continuing membership recruitment efforts.

Recruitment requires providing a compelling value proposition and innovating to meet members’ changing needs. In addition to offering practice support, advocacy, career development, and networking, ACEP must listen to needs of graduating residents and new attendings. With elimination of CME funding in many of our hospitals and groups, it is crucial to continue to add value and communicate that value to residents before graduation. Our state chapter members and leaders are uniquely positioned to follow EMRA’s lead in partnering with local EM residency programs to improve communication of ACEP’s value to EM-bound medical students and EM residents by hosting residency visits or local events relevant to our shared mission. In addition to outreach, we must further develop chapter-level engagement opportunities for residents and newly graduated attendings, providing a sense of belonging to our new members, and a leadership pipeline for the chapters’ future.

Retaining members requires maintaining trust and demonstrating continued value. Effective, timely, and personally relevant communication is required to achieve these goals. Creation of an accurate database of emergency physicians living and working within a state, as well as a network of each states’ EM groups and ED medical directors would help chapter leaders disseminate relevant information, strengthen advocacy efforts, and plan regional solutions summits to focus on unique challenges. Opening lines of communication with chapter leaders allows member and non-member emergency physicians to reach out with questions and concerns.