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[[image - emblem]] NMA SINCE 1895

NATIONAL MEDICAL ASSOCIATION
86th ANNUAL CONVENTION & SCIENTIFIC ASSEMBLY
Highlights

By Atlanta Medical Association
NMA Welcomed Back to Birthplace

The National Medical Association was born at the First Congregation Church at Courtland & Houston Streets, Atlanta, Georgia in 1895. Of the dedicated men present, Myles Link, M.D. suggested the formation of the NMA and Robert F. Boyd, M.D. was elected the first president. This meeting coincided with the Cotton States Exposition, which also impacted with Booker T. Washington's well known speech employing Blacks to improve their local circumstances.

Dr. Charles Victor Roman, stated that the NMA was "conceived in no spirit of racial exclusiveness , fostering no ethnic antagonism, but born of the exogenesis of the American environment the NMA had for its objective the bonding together for mutual cooperation and helpfulness, the men and women of African descent, who are legally and honorably engaged in the practice of cognate progression of medicine, surgery, pharmacy, and dentistry." Subsequent meetings of the NMA have been held in Atlanta in 1920, 1931, and 1970.
WELCOME BACK TO YOUR BIRTHPLACE!

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L. to R. NMA Past President Vertis Thompson, M.D., Oakland; ANMA Board Chairman Robbie Chissell, Baltimore; NMA President Frank royal M.D., Richmond, VA; ANMA President Vera Ricketts, Los Angeles; NMA Board Chairman, Phillip Smith, M.D., Los Angeles California Assemblywoman Theresa Hughes; Congressman Augustus F. Hawkins of California. [/caption]]

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[[caption]] Vertis Thompson, M.D., Obstetrician & Gynecologist from Oakland, California, is the President of the National Medical Association, Inc. He has worked diligently to make the National Medical Association's position known on the federal level with emphasis on Black Physicians in a decision-making process regarding Health Care in this nation. Dr. Thompson has guided the National Medical Association during this year when it was in the process of acquiring a new and more efficient National Headquarters.
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NMA Doctors' 86th Confab Resolves to Aid
Meharry
When the 86th annual convention of the National Medical Assn. (NMA) ended in Atlanta, some 4,000 participants left committed to rally behind an urgent appeal to save Meharry Medical College, the consensus number-one priority of the predominantly Black organization.
The plan calls for targeting the private sector and available grants more, and depending less on federal and state money for financial support of the Nashville, Tenn., school, but "it is the responsibility of every graduate of Meharry to respond to its needs," said 41-year-old Dr. Frank Royal after becoming NMA's 80th President.
In response to a suggestion by their young leader, to set an example of support of the school where many of them got their training, the Black medics pledged to raise $1 million for Meharry within the next 90 days, according to a spokesman for NMA.
"We must bring all of the resources of the NMA to help Meharry," said board Chairman Dr. Phillip Smith, who presented Rep. Augustus Hawkins one of the organization's four Scroll of Merit awards during the five-day meeting.
Royal, the Virginia Union University graduate who received his medical training at Meharry, also pointed to a decline in the enrollment of Black students in the nation's medical schools as another problem the NMA will tackle during his administration.
Predominantly Black medical schools and hospitals are struggling to keep their doors open as the need for Black health care grows, noted Royal, in disclosing that NMA will be studying and monitoring the Reagan administration Block Grant program and suggesting ways for shaping policy, particularly on the state level.
The president's ball, featuring entertainment by songstree Freda Payne, highlighted a social schedule of varied activities.

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