Susan R. Bailey, MD, an allergist/immunologist from Fort Worth, Texas, was elected president of the American Medical Association in June 2020. Previously, she served as president-elect of the AMA for one year, speaker of the AMA House of Delegates for four years and as vice speaker for four years. Dr. Bailey, who has been active in the AMA since medical school when she served as chair of the AMA Medical Student Section, has held numerous leadership positions with the AMA. These include serving as chair of both the Advisory Panel on Women in Medicine and the AMA Council on Medical Education, as well as representing the AMA on the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education, the American Board of Medical Specialties, and COLA. Her long history of service in helping guide organized medicine extends to the local and state levels as well. She has served as board chair and president of the Tarrant County Medical Society, and as vice speaker, speaker and president of the Texas Medical Association. Dr. Bailey is an allergist in private practice, and has been with Fort Worth Allergy and Asthma Associates for over 30 years. She completed her residency in general pediatrics and a fellowship in allergy/immunology at the Mayo Graduate School of Medicine in Rochester, Minn., and is board certified in allergy and immunology, and pediatrics and has been awarded the title of Distinguished Fellow of the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology. In addition to receiving her medical degree with honors from the Texas A&M University College of Medicine as a member of its charter class, Dr. Bailey was later appointed to the Texas A&M System Board of Regents by then Gov. George W. Bush, and has been named a Distinguished Alumnus of Texas A&M University and of Texas A&M University College of Medicine.
“Two of the newly approved codes report nucleic acid assays that allow a single test to simultaneously detect the novel coronavirus and a combination of common viral infectious agents, including influenza A/B and respiratory syncytial virus,” said AMA President Susan R. Bailey, M.D. “Concurrent detection promises to conserve important testing resources, allowing for ongoing surveillance of influenza while testing for the novel coronavirus.”
- New CPT codes for multi-virus tests detect COVID-19 and flu
"The flu vaccine is a safe, effective step that physicians and public health experts recommend to protect patients and their loved ones from getting sick with influenza. The potential impact of a bad flu season during the COVID-19 pandemic could place added burden on medical resources, which is why we are teaming up to urge all people to get a flu vaccine this fall and thereby help prevent seasonal influenza infections."
- AMA, CDC, Ad Council urge flu vaccination amid COVID-19 pandemic
“The AMA believes that it is critical that vaccine decisions, therapeutic decisions are made based on science and evidence and not on politics, ideology, or some sort of arbitrary timeline. We think it’s incredibly important for the FDA to be completely transparent about the parameters that it’s using to evaluate and approve vaccines and to let us know every step of the way as the approval process continues.”
“There are literally hundreds of tests that have been given, emergency use authorization by the FDA, and I think time will tell which one of the proprietary tests are going to end up being the most reliable. There is a danger in a test being too good and diagnosing bits of viral fragments that are left even though the patient isn’t contagious yet. So, I think the jury is still out for which is the best test for any point in time.”