Annual Meeting Update

SAHM 2021 Virtual Annual Meeting Highlights

By Dr. Anisha Abraham and Dr. Nicholas Westers

It’s just three weeks until #SAHM21, our first virtual annual meeting! The Program Committee has been working hard on planning a broad range of quality activities and sessions to meet the diverse needs of our membership. Here is a sneak peek at what we are offering.

Educational Activities
This year, we will have approximately 40 sessions covering six different tracks. These tracks include core clinical, research, clinical advances, public health, professional development/training/education, and our new youth engagement and empowerment track.

Here are a few highlights of sessions before and during the conference:

Wednesday March 10
Creative Solutions for the Identification and Management of Adolescent Anxiety and Depression in Diverse Populations During COVID-19 and Other Times of Global Crisis.
 
From Telehealth to LARC Doulas: Improving LARC Counseling and Insertion Experiences for Adolescents in the Era of COVID

Thursday March 11
Push-Outs, Not Drop-Outs: Transforming Health by Dismantling Systemic Racism in Education
 
Bias, Cultural Effectiveness, and Health Care Disparity: A Window into our Role as Clinicians and Advocates

Friday March 12
The COVID-19 Pandemic and Adolescent Nutritional Health: "Unmasking" Nutritional Disparities
 
Design with Youth, for Youth: Using Youth-Driven Design to Co-Design Health Programming with Young People

Plenary and Gallagher Lectures
We are delighted that Dr. Lee Beers, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, will be helping to open our conference on Wednesday followed by a plenary with Dr. Ruth Etzel, former head of the Office of Children’s Health Protection at the Environmental Protection Agency. On Thursday, Lourdes Rivera, senior vice president, Center for Reproductive Rights, will present our Gallagher Lecture on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights along with our youth speaker Madisen Barre-Hemingway. On Friday, Dr. Gaya Dowling, NIDA, Head of the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study will be speaking alongside youth speaker, Eunice Olajimi. Learn more.

Hot Topics
The Hot Topics session is one of the most popular parts of the SAHM meeting. This year we have expanded Hot Topics to run for three separate sessions. We are finalizing these speakers, but topics will include the impact of the COVID pandemic on adolescent health, telemedicine, structural racism and health inequities, graduate medical education during a pandemic and more!

Scientific Research
This year, we will feature four separate research platform presentation sessions including the Charles E. Irwin, Jr. New Investigators platform presentation session. Additionally, we will also have thematic poster symposia sessions throughout the conference and a virtual poster hall. The supplement to the Journal of Adolescent Health where all accepted research abstracts will be listed is now available online.

Youth Involvement
We are delighted to offer new opportunities to engage with non-trainee youth/young adults at the conference this year. We will have six inaugural workshops in the Youth Engagement & Empowerment Track where members co-present with youth collaborators. On Friday, we have an interactive, action-focused youth engagement training session to assess and build capacity for youth engagement, as well as a networking event for non-trainee young adult attendees to connect with each other. We hope you, and your youth collaborators, will consider participating in these ground-breaking sessions.

Networking Opportunities
Many SAHM members from around the globe attend the annual meeting to reconnect with old friends and welcome new colleagues. The networking committee has been working on events for attendees this year such as daily mindfulness sessions, an open forum discussion on the book How to Be an Antiracist, by Ibram X. Kendi, a media discussion led by Dr. Michael Rich and the viewing of the movie “Screenagers NEXT CHAPTER: Uncovering Skills for Stress Resilience.”

International Members
This year, we will have a roundtable discussion on “The impact of COVID-19 on adolescents and young adults” for members around the globe to share their country’s experiences, discuss lessons learned and reformulate ideas on how to support adolescents and young adults (AYA) globally.

Trainees and Young Professionals
Trainees and young professional members will find many exciting opportunities to meet at #SAHM21 including at the Research and Mentoring Forum on Tuesday March 9.

SIGSs
Special Interest group meetings will take place throughout the month of March, before and after the Annual Meeting. View the schedule and learn more.
 
We want to thank all the SAHM members that have worked hard to create this year’s virtual program. Registration is still open. Please feel free to contact us if ou have questions. Looking forward to seeing you at AM21!