arch 30, 1933. On this date, the first Doctors Day observance took place in Windsor, Georgia. Eudora Brown Almond, wife of Charles B. Almond, M.D., presented a formal resolution to the Barrow County Medical Society Auxiliary in order to set aside one day each year to honor physicians. The auxiliary adopted the resolution and proclaimed the day “Doctors Day” in recognition of Crawford W. Long, M.D., who first used ether anesthesia in surgery on March 30, 1842.

Evolution of Doctors Day
The first Doctors Day was celebrated by mailing cards to physicians and their spouses. Flowers were placed on the graves of deceased physicians. A formal dinner was held. In 1934, the Georgia State Medical Alliance adopted a resolution commemorating the day. Recognition of physicians became more widespread when the Women’s Alliance of the Southern Medical Association adopted the resolution in November 1935. At that time, they began the custom of using a red carnation as a symbol for Doctors Day. In 1958, the U.S. House of Representatives adopted a resolution commemorating Doctors Day; and in 1990, the House and Senate introduced joint legislation (S.J. Res. 366) that made March 30 a national day of observance. On October 30, 1990, President George H.W. Bush signed an executive order (it became public law 101-473) designating March 30 as “National Doctors Day.”

Changing Our Message
Traditionally, the February issue of the ASA NEWSLETTER is dedicated to the topic of communications. Members of the Committee on Communications (COC) submit contributions relating to communications and the activities of the COC. The chair of the COC is usually assigned the task of writing an article relating to Doctors Day, and in the past, the committee and ASA Communications Department created a theme for a video news release (VNR), media packets and a poster for release on March 30. The COC continues to update and improve the ASA public education and patient education resources and provide spokesperson training for our members. Due to the recent changes in the leadership in our Park Ridge, Illinois, office and in the Communications Department — along with the delay in the start of our branding campaign due to those changes and the resources allocated in the response to the movie “Awake” — the COC determined that it was best to not produce a VNR or Doctors Day poster for 2008. Our upcoming branding effort will determine the path that the COC activities follow in the future.

It was not by accident that this edition of the ASA NEWSLETTER has communications-related articles from an ASA officer, a member of the ASA Board of Directors, a resident in anesthesiology and a medical student applying for an anesthesiology residency position. All of their contributions advocate for our specialty, just as Eudora Brown Almond did more than 70 years ago.

Advocacy: The act of pleading or arguing in favor of something, such as a cause, idea or policy.

When our membership was surveyed, advocacy was at the top of the list in what our members desired from ASA. The leadership of our organization has responded to this and other member needs with a revised and updated strategic plan. Branding creates an image that will stick with our various audiences. A brand is a promise. To be effective, a brand must be lived throughout an organization and with every encounter outside of the organization. It must be marketed, both internally to our members and externally to our patients, the public and policymakers. While ASA can expend the resources for brand recognition and advocacy, the campaign will fail if our members don’t live the talk. We have some 43,000 advocates out there every day, with more than 25 million encounters each year. Yes, that’s the number of ASA members and the number of surgeries each year in the United States. Each and every one of us, from our medical students to our residents to our members, is responsible for fulfilling our promise to our patients.

ASA and all anesthesiologists should continue to take pride on March 30, a day recognizing the contribution of our specialty in alleviating pain and suffering, thanks to Dr. Crawford Long and Ms. Eudora Brown Almond, perhaps some of the first advocates of our specialty.

Michael H. Entrup, M.D., is Anesthesiologist-in-Chief, Tufts-New England Medical Center, and Chair, Department of Anesthesiology, Tufts University School of Medicine, Boston, Massachusetts.