Surriya Ahmad, MD

Between taking care of patients in both public and private inner-city Level 1 Trauma Centers and Tertiary care centers over the last seven years, and having an octogenarian father and nonagenarian grandmother who I have watched navigate the sometimes treacherous walls of an emergency department from the lens of a patient their age, I remained interested in how we can best optimize the care of older adults in the ED. I have been a member of SAEM and AGEM for five years, starting on the AGEM Outreach Committee. I served on the AGEM Executive Committee as a Member-at-Large 2021-2022, Treasurer 2022-2023, and Secretary 2023-2024. In December 2020, 2022 I co-organized and co-hosted a Leaders in GEM virtual event with the aim of generating early interest in GEM amongst medical students and residents and helping to connect them with mentors who have been successful in the field. We have the third one coming up in October! I also created a Geriatric Mental Health and Wellness/Well-being Collaborative Webinar Series this year between AGEM and the Behavioral & Psychological Interest Group of SAEM, and the first webinar was on AMS/Delirium and Managing Geriatric Agitation in the ED, including non-pharmacological interventions for the management of agitation. I graduated from the 2020-2021 EMRA Leadership Academy.

I am running for Secretary because I really enjoyed this position, and I have a passion for older adults and for AGEM and SAEM and I want to serve its members and collaborate with other leaders with a similar passion of providing the best care possible to older adults via this organization. If elected to the executive committee for 2024-2025, I hope to continue using any skills I possess to serve the organization, including to help advocate for the allocation of resources and funding towards diversifying the field of Geriatric Emergency Medicine, and minority and underserved Geriatric patients including decreasing depression, loneliness and social isolation in older patients. I also plan to bring my experience designing a Physician Wellness Curriculum in residency and improvisational comedy background to advocate for physician wellness and team bonding within the executive committee, AGEM, and SAEM.