News in brief

Virtual DO Day 2021 scheduled for March 7-8, 2021

Event will include Congressional meetings and a full-day advocacy and health policy conference.

Next year’s DO Day on Capitol Hill will take place virtually March 7-8, 2021. The meeting’s structure is being modeled on successful virtual advocacy fly-ins recently held with osteopathic affiliate leaders and the Student Osteopathic Medical Association as well as feedback received from fly-in participants.

Health policy conference

DO Day 2021 will include a full-day advocacy and health policy conference on Sunday, March 7. Session planning is currently in progress, but topics covered will include specific federal and state legislative priorities, regulatory and payment policy, state grassroots advocacy, social media and message training, and, of course, lobby day preparation and training.

The policy conference will include a learning track for student leaders, but will also focus on helping all leaders understand how to disseminate and apply the information they receive to their peers and in their advocacy efforts at home.

Congressional meetings

Congressional meetings will take place throughout the day on Monday, March 8. Despite the virtual format, meetings will be organized and structured similar to how they would be for an in-person lobby day. DO Day participants will be organized into small groups for Congressional meetings based on their home address and will be scheduled for three to six meetings with their U.S. Senate offices and members of the House of Representatives.

One important difference this year is that registration will be capped for each state. Based on feedback received from participants in recent SOMA and physician leadership fly-ins, there is a strong consensus that Congressional meetings are more productive when the meeting group size is limited. Registration limits for each state will be based on the size of the state’s Congressional delegation and state osteopathic association.

Registration for DO Day 2021 is expected to launch after Thanksgiving. More details will be available soon. Please e-mail sneal@osteopathic.org if you have any questions before then.

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