Let’s be honest – most young physicians starting out in private practice have a tough time navigating their new environment and all its responsibilities. Residency prepares us for the clinical challenges of practice, but for practice management, medical supervision, and the business side of private practice? Not so much. Even as attendings, we have yet to personally experience – and therefore can offer little training or preparation for – the transition to private practice.

To make matters worse, it can be intimidating to ask for help or guidance for fear of being judged or looked down upon. There’s a lot of pressure to appear as if you “have it all together” to maintain the confidence of your surgeons, new partners, or co-faculty.

ASA Community, our private, member-exclusive online discussion forum, provides young physicians with the solution to both problems. It’s the ideal place for residents and those transitioning into practice to ask for advice from more experienced colleagues all over the country – 24/7, from your smartphone. And you can post anonymously if you prefer, which is helpful cover for sensitive topics (not to mention professional pride).

ASA Community empowers young physicians to engage with their colleagues in three key ways:

  1. It’s an equal-opportunity platform. You don’t have to be an ASA committee member to get a word in. All members have equal voice, including those in typically underrepresented groups within the specialty. The community can even serve as a springboard to ASA leadership; those who establish themselves as subject matter experts can form connections they may not otherwise, especially those with young families and little opportunity for travel to live meetings and conferences.
  2. It’s a trusted source for information-sharing. There are many other online forums and social media hubs that a young physician might engage with, but on ASA Community you can be sure that the answers you seek are coming from other ASA members. The community serves as our member directory as well, so you can easily view others’ credentials and training.
  3. It’s a unique opportunity for “near-peer” mentorship. Most anesthesiologists are looking for mentors who are just ahead of them in their career journeys. For example, junior residents want to engage with senior residents, and junior faculty want to engage with early/mid-career faculty. Practicing physicians over 40 represent two-thirds of ASA Community’s active membership, according to the most recent member survey, and those physicians are exactly the right people to ask about, say, overhead expenses as a recent graduate, employment versus partnership, or student loan forgiveness. There’s even a blog series hosted by the Committee on Young Physicians that covers personal finance and financial literacy.