I had the opportunity last week to attend and speak at the AHDI Florida state meeting. There were some interesting presentations and I wanted to share some things with all of you since I know everyone couldn’t be at that meeting.

Let me first say that it’s been about five or six years since I attended a Florida state meeting. I used to go every year. With the move to Barbados, it became impossible to do. When I came back to the States, it just wasn’t feasible to do financially. I always enjoyed their meetings and had missed not going, so I was happy that they asked me to be a speaker this year. Their them for the meeting was “Awaken Your Spirit!” For me, it’s been almost two years since I attended any face-to-face AHDI meeting, and I can’t say that the last one I attended was all that pleasant. I’m afraid I had developed a good case of inertia about going to association meetings. Still, I have always liked the Florida folks and felt this one would be fun. I must say, for me, their meeting lived up to its theme. I enjoyed the entire time. Florida is a group that remains excited about our profession and the potential, and yet with the topics presented, they aren’t sugar-coating anything about the things we face in today’s healthcare industry. At the end of the meeting, as a group of us sat outside and visited (and made S’Mores by the fire), I realized that indeed that meeting had awakened my spirit. It simply recharged me. On top of a general feeling of not wanting to attend meetings, it’s been a rough few months around here. The sense of community was good for my soul. Thank you, Florida AHDI, for that and for the opportunity! If you’re ever able to attend one of their meetings, I suggest you do it! They do a great job and you won’t be sorry you were there.

The conference began with a presentation by Claudia Tessier titled “Medical Transcription and ICD-10: The Perfect Storm.” As many of you know, Claudia is the past AHDI (then AAMT) CEO and is well known to our industry. She spoke of the challenges of getting ICD-10 implemented and of the need it will create for additional coders in the industry. I was really quite interested in the studies that have shown that coding productivity will significantly decrease, and even after the learning curve of coders learning a new system, they will not be as productive in ICD-10 as they are now in ICD-9. And that, of course, will mean the need for more coders than are currently in the system. At the same time, many coders are not wanting to learn the new system, feeling it will simply be too much of a change for them. Much like the MTs population who started saying they would retire before learning speech recognition, coding is seeing the same thing. Now think about MTs and the knowledge we have. ICD-10 will require a greater understanding of things like anatomy and physiology, diseases processes, etc. MTs already have that, in fact, I would be so bold as to say we probably have more of that than many coders. It makes such perfect sense for a transition. The presentation definitely created a buzz and it was fun to watch people start to poke the box about the possibilities. I believe it’s a great opportunity for MTs who wish to do something different with the knowledge they have. The information from the US Department of Labor also predicts a good sized growth in this profession. It’s definitely one to check out and one where MTs can use the knowledge they already have, learn some new things, and have a relevant, sustained career path!

The medical speakers were also great at this meeting. It’s always wonderful to hear a physician talk about a passion for true patient-centered care. One physician spoke about radiology and trauma, and attendees seemed to truly enjoy his presentation. Ellen Drake did a great presentation titled “Not Your Mama’s Medicine Cabinet Anymore.” I find the way Ellen tackles pharmacotherapy to always fascinate me. The nanotechnology that she spoke of was very interesting. She also spent some time sharing her own personal experience with some of this technology.

I had a great time being a part of a group facilitation with Kim Buchanan and Brenda Hurley, where we presented on the importance of communication. I loved seeing what solutions the attendees came up with for the scenarios we gave them to solve.

My own presentation was titled “Rebranding the Profession.” As with posts here, I shared what I believe is happening in our profession, how we need to be proactive and poke the box, speak up for ourselves, and develop our own map for the future. I hope it was a message many took to heart.

Aside from lectures, the meeting was held in Daytona Beach at a beautiful hotel right on the beach. It was so relaxing to just be able to sit and watch the ocean waves. I have missed that since living in Barbados and have always found that did wonders for my spirit. Their welcome reception on the first night was held outdoors on a beautiful patio area, with the beach and ocean in the background. You can’t ask for much more than that. One thing that amazed me at that reception was to see how many people came from out of state for this meeting. The Florida meeting has a reputation of being a great one and people came from all over. On top of all of that, these folks are just great hosts.

Separate from the meeting, I also had a chance to have dinner with Nae Priest and Carole Gilbert. Nae is one of our authors on MT Inner Circle and no stranger to this group. Her very wonderful husband treated us all to a lovely dinner at a restaurant right on the water. It was great to see them and spend some time together.

I am grateful to AHDI Florida for giving me the opportunity to be a part of their meeting, and for putting on the kind of meeting that does indeed “Awaken the Spirit” in folks. I hope I don’t miss another one of their meetings because they are definitely good for you!

How about all of you? What meetings have you attended or do you plan to attend in your own area? I’d love to hear about what you find, why you attend and what you gain from them.