The second business meeting session of the Family Practice/Primary Care working group was held in the Maryland Room at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel on Tuesday, November 9 from 4-7 PM. Robert Hausam, the current WG chair, opened the meeting with a suggested agenda, which addressed the issues to be covered for the evening. Approximately 33 people attended this session.

Robert Hausam then announced the results of the ballot for the WG chair-elect. John Zapp will take office as chair-elect on 1/2000 and chair on 1/2001.

Paul Kleeberg, who manages the Fam-Med list, then addressed the group to summarize some upcoming changes at that site. Due to the tremendous amount of effort and expense involved in managing the site, for which Paul has assumed full responsibility to date, he has applied for 501C status. He explained that this would enable him to solicit tax deductible donations and possible corporate sponsorship to continue this work.

At this point discussion of the working groups committee structures was moderated by Robert Hausam, M.D. and John Zapp, M.D.. Prior to this date the WG had employed seven different committees to help manage the necessary duties of the WG. The number and focus of these committees were examined and some unnecessary or inactive groups were disbanded. The resultant committees were Clinical (Len Fromer, M.D., chair), Research (Ian Purves, M.D., chair), Education (Alan Zuckerman, M.D., chair), and Infrastructure (H.C. Mullins, M.D., chair).

A summary of the Retreat activities were reported by John Zapp, M.D.

There was a proposal to change the name of the WG. A lively debate and restatement of the same issues followed. John Faughnan, M.D. made a motion for the group to answer the following question. "Are you in favor of making a name change that will emphasize Primary Care?" The motion was seconded by Thomas Wessell, M.D.. The motion was carried by a vote of 17-6. The attendees then decided that the question of a new name would be put to the full membership of the WG through the use of individual balloting. This could be done on line. Suggested names for this proposal included: Primary Care Working Group, Primary Care Informatics Working Group, and Primary Care/Family Practice Working Group. Any membership comments may be directed to the WG chair. Copies of these comments may be sent to the newsletter in order to compile a summary report that can be published in a future issue of the newsletter. Confidentiality will be kept upon request.

The next issue reviewed at the retreat concerned the mission statement of the WG. John Zapp, M.D. made a motion that the mission statement remain as it is currently printed in the WG documentation. After a short discussion, the motion passed unopposed.

A brief discussion then ensued regarding the working groups relationship with other interested groups outside of AMIA, such as the AAFP. Suggestions by John Faughnan and Alan Zuckerman regarding the use of tutorials, white paper collaborations and other training sessions which could focus on primary care issues, with other groups were positively received by those in attendance. Examples of such activity could include packaging tutorials for CME credit, training tutorials, informative papers to provide information to other countries and presentations to other organizations, such as the AAFP. The initiation of these events will need further investigation by a subcommittee within the working group. No tentative plans were made at this time.

Nick Booth, a physician from the UK presented an interesting project to the working group. He has been working on a "Journal of Informatics in Primary Care". He requested that the working group help support his efforts. This journal is to act as an outlet for "works in progress" and for papers that may not be published elsewhere regarding primary care activities. He stated that copies of the journal are presently available on his website. This URL can be requested by emailing him directly, n.s.booth@ncl.ac.uk John Crossette made a motion to explore a joint business plan to collaborate on Nick Booth’s journal. This was seconded by John Zapp and a vote take was unanimous. Bob Bernstein then provided vocal support of the growth opportunities and international support such ventures would provide.

The group’s discussion then turned to subcommittee work within the working group. Robert Hausam, M.D., the working group chair, then asked for program committee suggestions. H.C. Mullins, M.D. nominated David Little, M.D. for next year’s Chair of the program committee. Dave accepted this position. John, Zapp, M.D., the present subcommittee chair, also agreed to continue within the subcommittee as this year’s chair. H.C. Mullins, M.D. made a motion for the administration committee to approach the AMIA leadership and request permission to develop our own scientific program without mandatory AMIA approval. Jacob Reider, M.D. seconded this motion, which passed unanimously.

At this point the agenda for the second business meeting was completed. The members in attendance then broke up into the subcommittee groups in order to develop the structures and agendas for each subcommittee. The results of this activity can be found in the paper by John Zapp, M.D. describing the activity of the strategic planning retreat.