From advocating with legislators, to new research, to the daily work of ASA members with patients, there is no shortage of ways to highlight the importance of the specialty. This rings even more true with awareness weeks that allow the work of physician anesthesiologists to shine. The fifth annual Physician Anesthesiologists Week was no exception. Since its inception in 2015, ASA members from all over the country have raised awareness of the importance of physician-led anesthesia care and issues of utmost concern to the specialty and the public, such as safe opioid use.
For Physician Anesthesiologists Week 2019, the PR team worked with a national business intelligence firm to field a 17-question survey of more than 1,000 parents of children aged 13-24, one-third of whom had been prescribed opioids, to determine what they understood about pain management for children and young adults. The results revealed that while 83 percent of...