Electronic Summer 2025 | Issue 63

Area 4 Advocacy Webinar

By: Jasleen Singh, MD

This April, the APA Area 4 Council's Education Committee put together a virtual advocacy webinar for trainees and early-career psychiatrists "Advocacy in Action: Building Skills to Shape the Future of Psychiatry". During the packed 90-minute session that served as this year's Area 4 annual Resident-Fellow Member event, there were multiple components ranging from an introduction to advocacy, panel of experienced advocates, sample skits, and then a breakout session for discussion. I was fortunate to get a glimpse of the behind the scenes planning by joining some of the brainstorming sessions and was also able to attend the session itself.  

The advocacy webinar itself was ripe with knowledge and experience from APA members and even featured two of our very own - Dr. Ken Busch and Dr. Sudhakar Shenoy. A brief Advocacy 101 didactic elaborated on the importance of advocacy and provided practical tips on how to interface with legislators, developing an "elevator speech", challenges to advocacy, and resources to become more involved. Subsequently, the "Perspectives from Experienced Advocates" panel was moderated by Dr. Shenoy, and featured Dr. Busch as one of the panelists who shared his wisdom and advocacy pearls from his decades of experience. After the panel, there were three skits that demonstrated advocacy at various levels - state, federal, and patient-centered, with subsequent breakout sessions to discuss the skits and material that had been covered throughout the night. 

Overall, the session was a great success, with approximately 50 participants who joined in. The positive feedback came in multitudes with people talking about how much they learned and even expressing a desire for this to become an annual offering.