As you look back at medicine and health care in 2019, take a minute to consider local journalists who helped the public understand a health issue and nominate them for the Texas Medical Association's Anson Jones, MD, Award. Three of last year’s award winners were nominated by a TMA physician or county medical society.
TMA is seeking nominations for the 2020 competition, which honors work produced in Texas during 2019. The awards feature categories for print, radio, television, and online news.
Jayesh Shah, MD, of San Antonio, nominated “Losing Limbs to a Terrible Disease,” a story that appeared in the San Antonio Express-News. The story reported “real health care issues in South Texas,” and promoted awareness to identify and prevent complications related to diabetes, Dr. Shah said.
Dr. Shah encourages physicians to support TMA’s commitment to recognizing outstanding journalists like reporter Melissa Fletcher Stoeltje (above left) – a repeat Anson Jones winner who also was named the Texas Health Journalist of the Year in 2019 for the second year in a row.
Zachary Jones, MD, of Frisco, nominated the award-winning “Dr. Death” podcast for last year’s Anson Jones competition because of how well reporter Laura Beil told the story.
“She clearly spent an enormous amount of time and effort chronicling the disgraced surgeon Christopher Duntsch and highlighting a previously unknown flaw in the medical education system regarding hospital credentialing,” Dr. Jones said. “The value of recognizing excellent reporting in health care allows the journalists to receive feedback on their work and hopefully pushes them to greater causes.”
Nominating a journalist is easy:
- Email your nomination. All TMA needs is the reporter’s name, name of story (if available), date of broadcast/publication, and the media outlet. Please try to include a URL.
- TMA will send a handwritten postcard to let the reporter know you nominated him or her, and for which story. (Nominations are due by Friday, Jan. 3, to allow time to alert the journalists.)
And if you actively provide news to your local media outlets, consider entering the Physician Excellence in Reporting category (or nominate a colleague who does), which is open to physician and medical students. TMA will accept contest entries until noon on Jan. 10, 2020. Enter your work today.
Visit the Anson Jones webpage for complete contest details. If you have questions, call Tammy Wishard, TMA outreach coordinator, at (800) 880-1300, ext. 1470, or (512) 370-1470, or email ansonjones[at]texmed[dot]org.
Tammy Wishard
Account Manager, Division of Communications and Marketing
(512) 370-1470