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PRESIDENT’S
MESSAGE

Continued from page 8

nosis and spend more on care than a patient who has a consistent re- Dr. Jayesh Shah addresses the audience at the BCMS officers installa-
lationship with the same physician. tion ceremony on Jan. 23.

As your medical society President, I will continue to advocate for or military physician; whether you are hospital-employed or insur-
the patients at the core of which is the physician- patient relation- ance-employed;
ship. Your involvement in the Bexar County Medical Society is at
the core of advocating for our patients and our profession. whether you are a military physician or a researcher; whether you
are in the first five years of practice or 40 years of practice; or
BCMS successfully fought for scope of practice issues so that pa- whether your practice is small or large.Your new home will provide
tient access to physicians stays intact. Physicians should continue the perfect environment for members to address common issues.
to lead the team-based care as healthcare continues to evolve in the Thanks to BCMS staff and able CEO.
next century. In the last legislature, 40 scope of practice bills were
introduced and organized medicine won all of them. BCMS has a new home for our legacy to continue so that all
our patients continue to receive the best healthcare like my mother
This was accomplished with only 10 percent of TEX PAC mem- did, for years to come and all our aspiring young people like my
bership and less than 1 percent of the members going to the First daughter Prachi, a public health student at UTSA and my son Aj,
Tuesday visit at the capital. This, in my view is unacceptable. It is a junior at Keystone, continue to feel that becoming a physician is
our moral duty as physicians to be members, to be a part of TEX still one of the best choices and feel that they have the strength of
PAC and to give our time and talent to protect this profession. an organization like BCMS to back them; because for BCMS -
“Every Physician Counts and Every Patient Matters.”
BCMS successfully helped to pass medical tort reform in Texas
to ensure access to care for patients. BCMS with TMA has been Thank you.
advocating for physicians, patients, and our community since 1853. Dr. Jayesh Shah
But we cannot do it without you. Next year we plan to develop fo-
cused key contacts for each state representative and senator because
they listen to their constituents and once we build the relationship,
it is easy to get our point across. With the 2016 election cycle com-
ing, this is the time for you to get engaged with our local state rep-
resentative and our senators.

For the past decade we have not had a BCMS member serve as
president of TMA. Now we have the man for the job. I have seen
him leading the BCMS delegation to TMA and now leading the
TMA delegation to AMA. He understands the issues at its core and
he will represent us all well at the Texas Medical Association. Dr.
David Henkes - is running for the position of President-elect of
TMA. Each one of us can do our part to ensure that a BCMS mem-
ber leads the state association in the upcoming election in May.

Thanks to my predecessors, past presidents of BCMS. Thank
you for your vision and service to the society. It is because of your
hard work, we are where we are today.

BCMS has a new home on 1604/ Lockhill Selma.
Our theme this year is BCMS is Our Society Where
“Every Physician Count’s and Every Patient Matters”

It does not matter whether you are an academic, private practice

10 San Antonio Medicine • February 2016