Letter from the MWLA President: NLA is for All!

In this LipidSpin edition of the “NLA Impact on the Health Community”, we highlight how the NLA contributes to the understanding of incredibility impactful issues in medicine.  

The NLA has contributed to many aspects of clinical lipid medicine with scientific statements, guidelines, and the Journal of Clinical Lipidology. The NLA continues to be actively involved in diversity, equity, and inclusion in medicine. The Take Health to Heart Initiative, highlighted in this edition, is one of the Foundation of the NLA’s newest collaborations working towards equitable care. This edition provides information on how the NLA has worked on improving provider payment. We discuss commonly seen issues in many settings, such as statin intolerance and approaches to adding lifestyle modification to treatment recommendations. We also highlight early career colleagues, those caring for the pediatric population, and provide a feature on the “hot lipid topic” of the moment for the medical community, Lp(a). 

The NLA as a whole is a great model for the health community. I still recall as a cardiology fellow attending my first NLA meeting and being so warmly welcomed by individuals who are now fantastic colleagues and mentors (and are part of this issue, since when you ask your mentors to help – they of course are always ready!). The NLA also has a unique quality which I saw when attending my first NLA meeting and continues – that of having a diverse and expansive membership – reflecting the “health community”. Along with clinicians from several subspecialities, care providers from many training backgrounds, and colleagues from multiple disciplines make up this association. The NLA continues to engage and increase trainees from all fields of medicine to become part of this community as well.  

This issue of LipidSpin has been put together by my colleagues in the Midwest Lipid Association and will hopefully be inspiring and will show all the ways the NLA interacts with the medical community and beyond. I hope we demonstrate how collaborative, engaging, and forward focused the NLA is and inspire you to continue positive work and impact the health community.