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- [00:00]
A
Foreign.
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B
Welcome back to the JOPPA Podcast. Today we have a special bonus episode for you where we're going to be discussing the AAPA 2026 conference and some of our insights into what's been going on around here at the conference. We are all together for once. We've never been together actually in the same room. Martine and Kim are with me and we get to record together and we thought we'd kind of just get together and talk to everybody about what we've been experiencing, what we've been seeing at the conference, some of the things that we've been involved with. So I'm just going to kind of dive right in. Welcome everybody. Glad to have you with us.
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C
This has been so fun. Joe and Martine Yes.
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A
I'm so happy to be with both of you together for this one and we've been having fun at the conference so I hope we can bring you some news and you can learn a few things from HOD to the conference session. So this will be the topic of our discussion today.
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B
Yeah, it's about time we were in the same room together so I'm glad we could do this. So first of all, I kind of wanted to go through and talk about kind of the major themes that we've noticed from the conference so far. Some of them have included just topics about advancing the PA profession itself. I've seen a lot about like technology and how adapting to technological and healthcare system changes and especially some of the supporting of well being for PAS PA students and the just long term development of PAS themselves. I think that's like we've seen that not only with the conference CME events, but I think we've seen that with our the HOD has really discussed a lot of that and even some of the things that we saw with like the main stage event that we, that we attended. I want to get your feedback. So what are the some of the things that you think about A.B. kim, if you want to start out, some of the things that you've experienced with some of these topics.
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A
Yeah.
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C
So I had the pleasure of attending many of the research in action sessions which really highlighted some of the amazing research that the many different teams are doing to further explore different trends in the PA profession. Not only different practice setting trends, but how they're implementing different wellness initiatives, implementing technology to help support some of these and what PAS are looking for. One of the big highlights from some of the research there was a really good research in action about factors influencing specialty choice by Mirel Abruzza who We've had on the PODC podcast before and by the NCCPA research team and they brought forward how important this idea of work life integration is to all of us. So excited. I know that they have a paper in the works and so maybe we can bring them forward on another podcast. But those. That was a really big takeaway.
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B
Oh, that'd be great. Yeah.
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A
I'm just curious. I didn't get to go to many sessions. Jo and I, we've been stuck in hod we just got into. So lucky you. You've been lucky. I'm curious, why have you been to most of those research in action? Are you interested in research? Why have you been to those sessions? You know, one of the neat things
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C
about the podcast, and we've mentioned it before, is that we get to interview these research teams and they're getting to, you know, I think we often in practice will be like asking ourselves how or why or why could we do something better? And they're looking into all of that. So that was exciting. And they're bringing forward ideas that are new to all of us to, um. Especially as we're going through such fundamental changes in our healthcare systems and landscape. Now. I will say I did go to some CME talk too, Martine.
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B
Yeah, I know.
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A
Yes. Um, yes, I sneak. I snuck out of the HOD to present on hypertension and I've gotten a lot of good feedback. Um, a lot of PAs came to talk to me after and I have to say I presented with Dr. Keith Fredman. He's an expert and I hypert. And. And a national and international hypertension expert. If you look him up, you'll see that most of his recent publications are around hypertension, but specifically in marginalized population black men. He specializes really in hypertension management and he was also the vice chair of the guideline writing committee, the new 2025 High High Blood Pressure Guideline. So basically that's what we presented on. He brought a lot of good perspective and to the discussion and it was very interesting to create this whole talk with him. We created our slides together and discuss what we would bring to PAs. And we left a lot of time for discussion at the end. I think we got a lot of good feedback from that.
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C
Yeah. One thing I appreciated from your talk was really highlighting some key points for all of us to get to know in practice. Do you want to mention some of those?
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A
So we had 10 key takeaways. I'll let Kim tell me what struck her. I'm turning it to you. Tell me what, what were top five or which ones you think were really relevant to your practice? I know you were outpatient as well.
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C
Yeah, I think one was a big call to action because hypertension is a very prevalent modifiable factor.
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A
Yes.
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C
And that there are some new changes in the classification definition.
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A
She was paying attention.
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C
Oh yeah, I know, I was sitting here. Yeah. But right the. You know, previously many of us might have learned about hypertensive urgency that is no longer a term for hypertension. That our target blood pressure when treating is 13080 and that we should really be using four different, our main medication classes for treatment of hypertension. So those are the thiazide diuretics, our ACEs are ARB, our calcium channel blockers and spironolactone.
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A
Yes, that's very good. Those were really the main message that we wanted to bring forward to pas. But also the reason why they remove hypertensive urgency is because we are trying to prevent patients to go to the hospital to get treated for hypertension. Even if it's 200, more than 200 systolic. We say unless the patient has symptoms, we call it hypertensive emergency. They don't need to be treated in the hospital, it can be treated outpatient because we don't want them to be getting IV hydralazine, clonidine, those rapid acting medications. Because we realize most of, and we have to know. So guidelines are written based on new research studies that came out after the previous guideline, the previous guideline was published. So since 2017 to 2025. So we have evidence, new evidence coming out and we use those to create those guideline and we have, we, we also mentioned those studies, for example BP Road, S3 and there's the Sprint trial. So a lot of trials give us information to come forward with those to make those recommendations. So basically unless it's hypertensive emergency, most patients will have those uncontrolled readings. It's because they are not either adherent to their medications, they are not being well controlled, they are not on enough medications. A lot of times when we resume their medications, when they go to the hospital, their blood pressure becomes controlled. So we don't recommend giving high bidralazine unless there is organ target organ damage. That's the main reason of this recommendation.
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B
Wow, I am sorry I missed that.
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C
A great talk.
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B
Yeah, it sounds like it.
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A
And we Talked about the four, the four main classes are the same. Calcium channel blockers, A's, ARBs, tiazide, diuretic. And we didn't mention Beta blockers. We. We want people to avoid using beta blockers as a first line unless you have comorbidities that call for beta blockers. You know, certain. You know, heart disease, heart failure. If you have other comorbidities, the fourth agent. Usually when patients are not. If patients are already on three medications, they're uncontrolled, you add spironolactone. So this is one. Another big thing as well. We talked about less than 130 over 80, but ideally less than 120 over 80. We should be aiming for most patients unless they are in an institution and lifestyle. A lot of patients will come, go to their doctors. Okay, we'll try lifestyle first before putting on medication. But lifestyle is not forever. So we say three to six months. Me personally, I don't wait six months. After three months, if lifestyle didn't work, it won't work. Talked about meditation in the lifestyle, but it's a rec. We call it recommendation to be. Meaning you may consider. Dr. Freddie was the vice chair in the discussion because there's a lot of discussion. Not everybody don't agree necessarily on the stuff that we are bringing forward. So we have to vote, actually. And his argument was like, I don't know if we can meditate ourselves out of this one. So, yeah, he's like, I don't know. Meditation. And then so discussion, we said, okay, you may consider. It's not gonna be a one. A recommendation, meaning that you have to do that. So those are some of the inside information, inside jokes we had creating the guideline. We talked about abstinence in alcohol. That was new, actually. That's what was on the news when the guideline came out. Everybody was focusing. Oh, and, oh, they say abstinence and no less than one drink. We're in New Orleans. Everybody's drinking. So at first we were gonna say abstinence, and we're like, what are we gonna do? In those places where people are used to drinking, if you give them a choice, they just gonna do whatever they want. So at least give them. Give them some guidance. So we say for male, no less than one than two drinks, and female, no less than one drink. So that's how we came out with this guideline. So these were the very more interesting things. There's a lot of new things in the guideline, but I encourage anyone to register to take the. Because it's. It's. It's been recorded. You can. I think I believe you can buy the CME on demand. You will be. Have access to that. And there's a handout with the top 10 takeaway from the new hypertension guideline.
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C
Yeah, if I know Joe and Martin, y' all are gonn doing that since you were stuck in hod.
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B
I do.
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C
I want to bring forward another CME before asking y' all more about the hod. So a big theme has been technology and integrating new technologies into the healthcare landscape. So one CME talk was on telemedicine and I learned a new term. Have y' all heard about website manner?
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B
No. What is that?
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C
I. So it is what we can do on our telehealth visits to help make our patients more comfortable. Um, so the recommendation is to first create a sense of looking at your patient by not looking at their face on the screen, but looking at the camera. That way they are going to feel more comfortable to share things with you. Remember, like, you might be in the comfort of your home, but not to slouch or fidget or eat or drink. And really to use strong communication skills, reminding, reminding yourself that there might be a delay for when your patients receive whatever you're sharing. So always give it a couple of seconds before moving on to the next question.
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A
These are great tips. So basically this is kind of a website or telemedicine etiquette.
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C
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And I learned a new thing too about. There is a term called digital redlining. So this is where patients, our patients who might be living in certain low income neighborhoods might not have access to high speed broadband Internet. So they will have delayed Internet service out of no fault of their own. So something that we should all be mindful of.
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A
Yeah, so definitely.
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C
Yeah.
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A
Thank you for all those tips. So you attended those sessions for Jo and I and to bring us all the information. I like that. Thank you.
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C
Now, Joe and Martine, you are the advocates. Tell us about hod.
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B
Well, I, you know, so I, I kind of thought, you know, maybe we would talk a little bit about hod, just from a. The House of Delegates, from a sense of what is it? Because I, I will fully admit that before I became involved, I knew what it was, but I didn't really know the whole breadth of what it dealt with. And like all the people that are involved with it. Now, Martine, you've been a member like one of the House of Delegates for,
- [11:33]
A
for three years now. And I must say, the first year I came, I was lost. I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't know what it was about the orientation that they do for the delegates and we gave them that. We gave that feedback. It doesn't really train you or prepare you for what it really is and what your work will be. So. But after the first year, you become a pro. Trust me, you will learn so much doing, doing those three days that after the second year, I was more comfortable. This year. I could predict things. I could know what I'm voting on, when I'm voting, when not. But I think it's good to tell our listeners. First, what is hod? How does someone become a delegate for your state or your specialty organization? Actually, so any caucus can have a seat, and it depends on how large it is. Get a number at the hod, but you can, I think, Joe, you want to tell people how. What is the HOD?
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B
Yeah. So. So the. So the AAPA has a. Has a great website on the HOD 101. But in general, the House of Delegates is our policymaking body for the aapa, and it has the sole authority to establish policies that reflect our collective values, our philosophies and principles of the PA profession. So it is made up of a whole bunch of different organizations. Essentially, there are 58 constituent chapters. This is all 50 states. Washington, D.C. puerto Rico, the U.S. virgin Islands. And then there are five federal services. There's 27 recognized specialty organizations. There's 15 caucuses. There's the student academy. Then you've got the past house officers who serve as delegates at large. And then, so the. Essentially the delegates influence making recommendations to the AAPA board of directors. They submit formal resolutions. They participate in reference committee hearings during the annual HOD meeting at the AAPA conference. And then they serve on reference committees that review, like, basically the resolutions and then all the testimony that is given during. Hodges. So, and, you know, essentially, if you wanted to become a member of one of these organizations, like to become a delegate, it really kind of depends on your constituent organization that you're. You're working through. Maybe it's your. Your state association. I know for, like, for me, for Arizona, we essentially have elections through our state association. We. We present nominations and then go through an election process, and then that's. That's how we're chosen. May be different. Is that the same for Florida? Yeah, and I think most, most are. Are like that. Now, I don't know about some of the constituent organizations. They may do some.
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A
Yeah, some specialty organizations are different. We nominate because they are smaller. We don't necessarily have. Sometimes you only have one. You. You need to submit only one delegate. So it's either from the board of directors we can nominate Someone or you can apply. It depends. It varies from organization to another.
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B
Yeah. And you know, I think as we saw this year in the hod, we, we ended at HOD today. We finalized and, and recessed and on time. Yeah. Which was really nice. It was really nice. Yes. But, you know, I think it's always interesting that some of the themes that we've talked about with the conference itself fall right in line with some of the themes that the policies that we're discussing in HOD as well, you know, a lot of, like the, the wellness and making sure, like the progression of our, of our own career or our profession, you know, definitely protecting our, Protecting. Yeah.
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A
Protecting our role. Redefining what our philosophy should be, what we should encourage. And usually also it reflects the current political landscape. If you want climate. There's, there's usually a lot of policies around that depending on what's going on in the world. What's going on. I remember last year there were more controversies. So it depends on also what the situation is. So it reflects a lot about our daily lives, not just.
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B
Yeah, well, and that brings up a point about, with the policy review period. So all of our policies, whenever they are voted on and they expire after five years and we have to vote on them again. And usually they come up for this policy review. And it's actually a really good way to keep them up to date. And because of the fact that things change, language changes, the politics change around. Around things. So, so it's a good way for us to keep up to date. And then if there, if there's reference to, say, research material in some of our policy papers, making sure that the research is up to date as well.
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A
We had a policy paper on telemedicine because I was on the commission also of health, of the public commission. So we worked on some of those policy reviews that have to do with public health. So we have a lot of the immunization stuff we had to make a lot of. We have to amend a lot because we had cdc, for example, listed. Right. So a lot of those public or government organizations and some now, you know, you know, the political climate now. So we try to avoid naming organizations. So to stay up to date and just say, you know, following evidence based medicine. So we keep, we keep changing things into evidence based medicine. And also there was another one. So we had those policy. Oh, and the telemedicine, we had new research. So let's say we're talking about Healthy People 2020. So there's a new one, for example. So we have to refer to this new one. So a lot of those changes we have to make, and we tend to try to avoid adapting to one specific period of time so that they can stay current. So we are trying to move away from policy papers and do statements so that we don't need to keep changing, because a lot of the research changes. Organizations, they change. So we try to stay away from naming organizations now in our policy papers.
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B
Yeah, there's definitely a move to try to make it, I think, make these policies more. Give them longevity. Right. So that. So that they make sense moving forward, that in the future we have to make less changes. That's where I'm from. Yeah. You know, the other thing, though, I know that we all attended was the main stage event, which. Yeah, we got to sit next to each other and, you know, I think it fell right in line with some of the things that you were talking about with. With your own, like. And caring for patients with hypertension. Yeah. So it was the. From kitchen to clinic with Emeril lagasse Penns, Jessica DeLuise and. And then Chef Carmine, my favorite, the star of the show. He was great. Yeah, no, it was. It was really good. It was very interesting how they. They were talking about the. The use of fresh produce in your. In your daily cooking and how we can really monitor a lot of our int. Monitor salt intake and, like, making sure that we're using less processed foods, those kinds of things in our diet. Yeah.
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A
And making it delicious. So colorful and tasty. I was. I was watching the show. I was so. They were getting. I was so hungry just watching it. And I think AIPA did a great job with this main stage event. It was so different. I felt like I was in those live. You know, those live cooking show on tv. It was so well organized and orchestrated, and I thought it was just great. And a lot of tips to learn how to counsel your patients about lifestyle, how they can use simple food every day that you get from the supermarket and make simple meals. So they were trying to teach us in that. In that. In that they prepared three dishes, I
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C
think, and they were very small dishes.
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A
Exactly, exactly.
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C
I felt intimidated. Emeril Lagasse coming. What is he gonna make? And he ended up making a wonderful stir fry, a vegetable stir fry, a shrimp roll, and then a fruit salad.
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A
And it was that simple. You had your protein, you had your veggies and everything. I. I think it was awesome.
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B
Yeah. Very approachable. And, yeah, I definitely want to make those spring rolls. Those look delicious with that dipping Sauce. The peanut. The peanut butter dipping sauce.
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A
I was wondering if they had the recipes online on aap.
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B
That's a good question. I don't know. We'd have to look.
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A
I don't know where to find them because I'm like, they must have the
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B
recipe somewhere, because they've got to. Yeah, we'll have to figure that one out. If it's not on there, we'll have to figure that one out then. You know, as far as. For me, I, I. Yeah, I've been an HOD for the last few days. I did get a chance to be involved with an emergency medicine escape room for some PA students, and it was. It was a lot of fun. It was definitely. I'm not a big escape room person, because that's just. I just haven't really done a whole lot of escape rooms. No, I'm not. No.
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C
He should be escaping hod.
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A
Yeah,
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B
exactly. I should be escaping the hod, definitely. But, no, it was a lot of fun. And, you know, I think this is why, like, for me getting into academia, like, that excitement of working with the students and that excitement that they had during. During the whole event, it was great. I mean, it was very engaging for everybody. I mean, it was a lot of excitement. And I was working with another facilitator, and we were just amazed at how fast those students were working. Like, they. They were on it. They were reading through the problems so quickly, and they were answering it so quickly. I mean, it. They had an hour, basically, to get out of the escape room. And ours, like, our group got done in, like, 39 minutes or something like that. They did. They did really well. Yeah, it was. It was really good, but it was. It was all about, like, they had to. Basically, they had to treat an abdominal pain patient. They had to work with a patient that had an eye problem. They had to work with another one was defining some Salter Harris fracture. So it was. It was really cool to kind of work through these patient cases and getting those cases right. That led them to the next step and how to. And how to unlock the chest and everything. It was. It was really good. It was a lot of fun.
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A
Interesting. And something that AAPA should keep bringing back, sounds like.
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B
I think so.
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A
Definitely expand it to other.
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B
Yeah, I think they could definitely do that.
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C
I have to tell y' all how impressive the student presence has been at this conference.
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B
Oh, yeah, definitely.
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C
Yeah. Yeah, like. And let me just give a couple of examples. So I got to help out with a wellness hackathon yesterday, and the students have such insight into things like imposter syndrome and perfectionism and the antidotes to all of those. So I. They really identified things that I couldn't identify until five years into my career. And they. Some other awesome things that I've seen. They are taking some of their skills. So in the expo hall, they've been doing point of care ultrasound and this competition, there have been so many poster presentations by students. Really in the level of. The caliber of these posters is. It's just superb. So I know the future's looking bright.
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B
I know, right? Yeah, it's definitely. Oh my gosh. What else have we seen? Have we seen anything else? Did you guys go to. Well, we went to the expo. Yeah. And that was really fun. I mean, it was full of excitement
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C
as I switched to different orchestration.
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B
Oh, yeah, yeah, that was great.
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A
See more. I see one more added. One more added. And that's great. You said there were 27 specialty organizations. So every year we have a new. I see a new booth of a new specialty organization. That's good to see this support to PAs in different specialties. I think that's very important.
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B
Yeah, no, that was. It's been really nice to see the diversity out there of all the different organizations and representation that's out there. Um, so that's been really good. Um, and then.
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C
Oh, those are some more of the research things that I saw. There's so much. Guys, we're gonna have to have future podcast episodes where we invite these research teams. I guess some of the big discussions in the. The research in action to go. Go back to that were the how PA fellowship and the PA doctoral degree are changing the landscape. And so there were some very good discussion about impacts on compensation over time. And you know, why people are choosing to either seek going to a fellowship or a doctorate. So I know the manuscripts were in the works. The amazing thing is about these research teams is that they, they invited feedback as they're finessing their. Their data analysis. So. Yeah, I know these were fascinating sessions.
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B
Oh, that's fantastic. Okay. You know, I think it's also, I. I wanted to at least mention when we talk about the. The wellness idea and the fact that during the conference, if. I don't know if, you know, if our listeners, if maybe some people haven't been to a conference before, but all the other events that go on outside of the conference itself. Right. I mean, there are so many things involved. I mean, they have the yoga and meditation. They have the different, like aerobics type classes that they do in the morning, they have all of the, like, PA night out that's coming up, the Ghost tour, the Bayou tour that they're doing for New Orleans. So there's a lot out there as far as like social and social events and being able to kind of be
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C
around some other PAs reuniting with your PA programs. Like so many reunions are happening tonight.
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A
Yes, every night. I hear There are many PA programs or people who've graduated 40 years ago. They still meet in person. A lot of small get together and meetings. That's really awesome to see that camaraderie between PAs in general.
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B
Yeah, no, it's been really good. So, you know, as far as, like, what else you know, I know one other thing that we can mention and by the time that this is released, everybody will already know that next year the conference will be in Phoenix, my hometown. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we're looking forward to hosting everybody for Phoenix, Arizona next, next year. Yay.
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C
Where to go.
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B
I know it'll be great. Yeah. So I'm excited to have you guys there so we can meet up again. Definitely.
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A
Yeah. So we encourage our listeners to start planning. It's always around the same time in May so that we can. I think they already gave those HOD days. It's from May 14, so that's when the conference will start. You can start planning. I think APA has done a great job with their main stage event, their sessions. They're very relevant to practice. You, you will learn for sure. The connections, networking, everything has been very, very interesting.
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B
Yeah, definitely. I mean, you think about the fact that, I mean, we're talking about thousands of PAs that gather for this kind of an event. So it's, it's definitely well worth it for networking and just to really further your education, because it is. I mean, these are some of the leaders in areas that are talking to you. So I think it's, it's so worth it. And I think that, like, we've discussed with some of the, the differences in how they're presenting some of these workshops and things to really innovate teaching. I think, I think it's, it's really nice that the AAPA is so advanced in making sure that they're getting that education out there.
- [26:48]
C
So bring it in circle, Joe.
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A
Advancing the profession, the time. I get to see Kim in person once a year, actually. I see her annually at the conference, so it's been great. Yeah.
- [27:00]
B
Oh, my gosh. All right, well, thank you guys very much. We just wanted to make sure that you were aware of this wonderful event and we wanted to kind of give you a well rounded synopsis of what we've been experiencing. And we hope that you will join us next year at AAPA 2027 in Phoenix, Arizona. Thank you, guys.
- [27:19]
A
Thank you. And I want to mention, it's not just BA and PA students. They also have tracks for pre pas.
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B
That's right. Yes, definitely. We include them. Most definitely. All right.
- [27:29]
C
All right. Thank you, everyone. See you next year.
- [27:31]
B
Thanks. Bye.