Welcome, and thank you for subscribing to NMA's e-newsletter. Here you will get information about NMA activities and programs and find issues that affect you and your colleagues. Should you have information that you want to share with your colleagues, please submit to http://www.enews@nmanet.org. You are encouraged to email this e-newsletter to other colleagues and healthcare professionals.

Mohammad Akhter, M.D., M.P.H., was selected as the new Executive Director of the National Medical Association. A renowned leader in international and public health, Dr. Akhter previously served as the Executive Director of the American Public Health Association (1997-2002), as the D. C. Commissioner of Public Health (1991-94), and as Senior Adviser to the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.

The preliminary program for the National Medical Association’s 2007 Annual Convention and Scientific Assembly August 4-9, 2007 Honolulu, Hawaii is now available on the NMA website.

John O. Brown, Florida's first black ophthalmologist, a World War II hero and a Miami civil rights activits, died of heart failure. He was 84. He served as NMA President in 1986.

In 2005, the National Medical Association (NMA) began a diabetes outreach project with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in collaboration with the National Diabetes Education Program (NDEP). 
 
This April, the NMA Diabetes Education Program launched a comprehensive website www.NMAdiabetesnet.org, that offers NMA, CDC, and NDEP diabetes news; the latest diabetes statistics and NDEP educational materials; updates on coalition activities; diabetes information for consumers, patients, and the general public; and for physicians, useful diabetes guidelines, Power Point presentations, and other relevant information. 

The NMA has launched a new health information campaign and website: stopsmoking.nmanet.org to promote smoking cessation.  As part of this campaign, NMA President, Dr. Albert W. Morris, Jr. encourages people to stop smoking by sharing ways to quit in his recent article Smoke-Free for Life: Tips to Quit.  

Go to Smoking Cessation website >
Go to Dr. Morris' article >

The Sister Study, a project conducted by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, is seeking 50,000 women whose sisters have had breast cancer to help research the causes of breast cancer.  For more information, visit  www.sisterstudy.org or, for Spanish, www.estudiodehermanas.org.  Call toll-free 1-877-4SISTER (877-474-7837). Deaf/Hard of Hearing call 1-866-TTY-4SIS (866-889-4747).

Go to website >

In 2007, the Journal of the National Medical Association will publish theme-based issues from September through December. Please consider these themes as you submit articles. See a full description of the themes as listed in the Call for Papers flyer.

The CDC will broadcast this important forum on awareness, issues and services related to the crisis of HIV/AIDS among Men Who Have Sex With Men on May 17, 2007 1:00-3:00 PM EDT. The program will focus on research and programs throughout the country and experts will answer questions from viewers.  The broadcast can be downloaded and/or viewed at: http://www2.cdc.gov/phtn.  

Go to informational webpage
Go to webcast page  

Despite the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, twenty Baton Rouge physicians established the Greater Baton Rouge Surgical Hospital (GBRSH) offering services from orthopedic surgery to gynecological surgery to comprehensive imaging. The GBRSH was established in 2005 and represents the first such hospital owned and operated by African American physicians in several decades. For additional information, visit www.gbrsh.com.