Vice President Candidate

Mark P. Bouchard, M.D., FACSM
Medical Director and Physician
Maine Medical Center
Portland, ME 

1.  Please list your previous service to ACSM.

My previous service to ACSM includes serving on the Credentials Committee from 2004-2009.  I served on the Board of Trustees as a clinical medicine representative from 2009-2012.  I have served on the Publications Committee from 2009 to the present.  Finally, I also was a lecturer at ACSM’s International Team Physician Course in Monterrey, Mexico in 2006 and directed the same course in Bogota, Columbia in 2007.

2.  What is ACSM’s greatest strength and how would you make that aspect of the organization even stronger?

ACSM’s greatest strength lies in the diversity and expertise of its membership.  The energy of this membership in terms of its research and promotion of exercise science is impressive.   As a practicing primary care physician, the knowledge I have gained through ACSM has helped me guide my patients towards healthier and more active lifestyles.  As a sports medicine physician, techniques taught by my clinical ACSM colleagues have helped me to prevent and treat injuries for patients and athletes.  As a teacher of both primary care and sports medicine, I encourage students and residents to promote the benefits of exercise as they treat their own patients and athletes.

Through my service on the Credentials Committee, I have come to appreciate the expertise of ACSM’s members in the exercise sciences and clinical sports medicine. My hope is to increase membership involvement of both the allied science fields and the health and fitness fields where their participation at the leadership and “grass roots” levels could further promote our philosophy that “Exercise is Medicine”.

3.  What is a second area of ACSM that you would like for the College to make additional progress, and how could that best be done?

A second area that I would like to promote is increasing ACSM’s collaboration with other clinical sports medical societies.  Currently, ACSM works with the American Medical Society for Sports Medicine and the American Orthopedic Society of Sports Medicine to produce the annual Advanced Team Physician Course. These and other organizations have also collaborated on the Team Physician Consensus Conference statements on topics such as concussion management, mass event medical coordination and the care of the female athlete.  There remains ample opportunity for all of these organizations, including ACSM, to share their resources in order to help promote the research, educational and clinical programs that are currently being developed.   

4.   ACSM works closely with many other organizations, including associations, companies, philanthropies, and governmental agencies. Indicate those organizations/companies/agencies for which you play an advisory, consulting, or leadership role.

I currently serve on the board of MaineHealth’s Accountable Care Organization (ACO).  MaineHealth is a not-for-profit organization of 7 hospitals that has partnered with approximately 1,000 primary care and specialist physicians in southern Maine in this effort.  The goal of this ACO is to provide cost efficient, patient-centered care while achieving high quality health outcomes.  My hope is to help incorporate ACSM’s message that “Exercise is Medicine” in the planning of the healthcare delivery systems that are being developed in this organization.