Medical Student Division

Advocacy

Please send any comments, questions, or concerns to advocacy@amwa-student.org. For more information on national AMWA advocacy initiatives, visit AMWA’s Advocacy Main Page, view Position Statements to learn where AMWA stands on the issues, and AMWA’s past Letters and Amici. Our Student Newsletter will also keep you up to date on monthly current events and advocacy resources. Thank you!

Government

Contact your Congressional and State Representatives, at the same time, through this simple online message form. Let them know that you stand with AMWA on important issues!

For advice on how best to write your congresspeople, including email templates, check out these resources from the American Psychological Association here.

Health Policy

Visit Raising Women’s Voices for the Health Care We Need, a national initiative working to make sure women’s voices are heard and women’s concerns are addressed as policymakers put the new health reform law into action. RWV was founded by the Avery Institute for Social Change, the National Women’s Health Networ, and the MergerWatch Project of Community Catalyst.

Raising Women’s Voices recently published a particularly compelling piece on What Health Care Reform Will Do for Women and Families.

Current Affiliations and Projects

Check out the following guides and information for medical students:
Domestic Violence Awareness
Sexual Violence Against Women

General Health Information

HealthCare.gov – A federal government Website managed by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.

Womenshealth.gov – The subset Website from the Office on Women’s Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

AMWA Advocacy Calendar

January

  • Cervical Health Awareness Month
  • National Stalking Awareness Month
  • National Birth Defects Prevention Month
  • National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month
  • January 6-12, 2013: National Folic Acid Awareness Week
  • January 22, 1973: Supreme Court Decision on Roe V. Wade was issued

February

  • International Prenatal Infection Prevention Month
  • National Teen Dating Violence Awareness and Prevention Month
  • February 24-March 2, 2013 is National Eating Disorders Awareness Week
  • February 3rd: Happy Birthday Elizabeth Blackwell
    • Elizabeth Blackwell was the first woman to receive a medical degree in the United States. She graduated on 23 January 1849 from Geneva Medical College.

March

  • National Endometriosis Awareness Month
  • Women’s History Month
  • March 8th is International Women’s Day
  • March 10th is National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day
  • March 23rd, 2010: the Affordable Care Act passed

April

  • Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month
  • Women’s Eye Health and Safety Month
  • April 21-27: National Infertility Awareness Week
  • April 3rd: Happy Birthday Jane Goodall
    • Goodall studied social and family interactions of wild chimpanzees in Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania for 45 years. She is the founder of the Jane Goodall Institute and has worked extensively on conservation and animal welfare issues.

May

  • American Stroke Month
  • Lupus Awareness Month
  • National Arthritis Awareness Month
  • National Osteoporosis Awareness and Prevention Month
  • National Teen Pregnancy Prevention Month
  • Preeclampsia Awareness Month
  • May 12: Fibromyalgia Awareness Day
  • May 12: Mother’s Day
  • May 14: National Women’s Check-Up Day
  • May 12-18, 2013: National Women’s Health Week
  • May 13-19, 2013: National Alcohol & Other Drug-Related Birth Defects Week
  • May 27: Happy Birthday Rachel Carson
    • Carson was an American marine biologist and conservationist whose book Silent Spring and other writings are credited with advancing the global environmental movement.

June

  • National Scleroderma Awareness Month
  • National Congenital Cytomegalovirus Awareness Month
  • June 7: Happy Birthday Virginia Apgar
    • Apgar is the developer of the Apgar score, a method of assessing the health of newborn babies that has drastically reduced infant mortality all over the world.

July

  • International Group B Strep Awareness Month
  • July 25: Happy Birthday Rosalind Franklin
    • Franklin’s work led to the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA. She used x-ray diffraction to study DNA, RNA, coal, viruses, and graphite.

August

  • National Immunization Awareness Month
  • National Breastfeeding Month
  • August 1, 2012: The “Contraceptive Mandate” of the Affordable Care Act came into effect. It mandates that all new health insurance plans cover access to preventive health care services including mammograms, FDA approved contraceptives, STI testing and counseling, breastfeeding support, domestic violence screening and counseling without deductible, co-pay or cost-sharing.
  • August 1-7: World Breastfeeding Week
  • August 15, 1896: Happy Birthday Gert Corti
    • Gerty Cori was the first American woman to win a Nobel Prize in science (1947) for discovering the enzymes that convert glycogen into sugar and back again to glycogen.

September

  • Women in Medicine Month
  • Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month
  • September 14, 1879: Happy Birthday Margaret Sanger
    • Sanger is widely considered the founder of the modern reproductive rights movement. She was a birth control advocate, nurse, and sex educator who opened the first birth control clinic in the United States and founded Planned Parenthood.
  • September 25: National Women’s Health and Fitness Day
  • September 27: RAINN Day (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network Day)

October

  • National Breast Cancer Awareness Month
  • National Domestic Violence Awareness Month
  • October 19: National Mammography Day

November

  • National Family Caregivers Month
  • November 1st, 1848 : The first medical college for women opened.
    • Twelve women enrolled in the New England Female Medical College in Boston to study midwifery, but two years later the college began offering a full medical curriculum. It merged with the Boston University School of Medicine in 1874.
    • November 7th: Happy Birthday Marie Curie
      • Curie is the only woman ever to win two Nobel Prizes. In 1903 her discovery of radioactivity earned her the Nobel Prize in physics. In 1911 she won it for chemistry.

December

  • December 1: World AIDS Day

You can find more information about many of these dates here.

Past Affiliations and Projects

Pearl of Wisdom – The Pearl of Wisdom Campaign to Prevent Cervical Cancer is a united, global effort to raise awareness of the opportunities now available to prevent cervical cancer, launched in the U.S. in January 2009.

The Clothesline Project – The Clothesline Project is a program started in 1990 on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, to address the issue of violence against women. It is a vehicle for women affected by violence to express their emotions by decorating a shirt. They then hang the shirt on a clothesline to be viewed by others as testimony to the problem of violence against women. With the support of many, it has since spread world-wide.