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AME RIC AN AS S O C I ATI O N O F P H Y S I C I S TS I N M E D I CI N E We advance the science, education and professional practice of medical physics
AAPM Column VOLUME President’s 37 NO. 6
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2012
AAPM President’s Column Gary A. Ezzell, Mayo Clinic Scottsdale
wo recent events have given me reason to think about the related T issues of governance and trust: the dues vote and the public controversy about the lawsuit against AAPM. First, I am very glad that the dues vote passed. It was needed, and the association will be healthier for it. Many thanks to the 51% who voted for it. To the 49% who voted against, thank you for voting – and your skepticism is noted. The difference between the sentiment of the Board and the membership is striking to me. The Board voted overwhelmingly three times to ask for a dues increase in 2008 and 2009 (before any mounting lawsuit costs) and again in 2011. The membership only passed it by a small margin on the third try. Governance by representative democracy clearly has a different dynamic than governance by plebiscite, especially when it comes to money. With respect to the lawsuit against AAPM and the costs incurred, a concern that was raised on the BBS and listservs over and over again was “why was the membership not informed?” It is a fair question. Responding that the Board has been informed is both true and assuredly unsatisfactory to many. If everyone trusted the Board implicitly then it would not have been so difficult to get a dues increase approved. There actually is a better answer, one that has to do with the particular nature of this lawsuit. In 2009, K&S, an Accredited Dosimetry Calibration Laboratory, filed an anti-trust lawsuit against AAPM alleging that we, along with the other ADCLs, conspired against it after it was purchased by PTW in order Included in this issue: to revoke its accreditation and put it out of business. I will not discuss the history or merits of the arguments while the p. 3 lawsuit is pending. However, I will point out this one key Chair of the Board President-Elect p. 5 fact. If we had kept the full membership informed about how we were defending ourselves and the mounting costs, Executive Director p. 6 we would have unavoidably cast K&S in a bad light. How Editor p. 9 could it be otherwise? The other side could then use that Professional Council p. 10 as “evidence” of our alleged continued efforts to conspire Education Council p. 11 against them and cost them business. I am only writing CAMPEP News p. 13 this now because I feel it absolutely necessary. I will try to mitigate any damage by confirming that K&S remains Health Policy/Econ Issues p. 14 accredited, and there has never been any concern about ABR Trustees Report p. 17 the accuracy of their calibrations. Coolidge Award Introduction p. 19 The underlying issue is whether an ADCL should be Coolidge Award Acceptance p. 21 owned by a manufacturer of the equipment it calibrates. Leg. & Reg. Affairs p. 24 AAPM’s long-standing policy has been that this is not an Radiation Oncology acceptable situation. This has been the consistent policy Accreditation Workshop p. 26 since before 1999, when it was applied to prevent another p. 27 manufacturer’s lab from becoming an ADCL. Ironically, Obituary K&S led that opposition at the time. We did not change the