CEO Update, July 2026

New Fellow Pathway

“Coming together is a beginning;
Keeping together is progress
Together is success”
—Henry Ford

Membership is about community. Finding a community of peers as a nice base to learn and share. Networking around professional challenges — both clinical and practice issues. And gaining that feeling of not being on an island all by yourself.

“Community is much more than belonging to something; it’s about doing something together that makes belonging matter,” Brian Solis

AAOA’s culture centers on community.  We continue to implement new learning formats at our Annual Meeting and Courses to help you connect and find meaningful ways to engage.    This year’s Annual Meeting will continue to build on connection.

Taking advantage of the desert oasis afforded by the Loews Ventana Canyons, our Annual Meeting Planning Task Force is putting the finishing touches on a stellar program.

Highlights will include:

• Worst case denials and mitigation strategies to effectively secure reimbursement
• MABs, New Horizons, and Individualizing Patient Care
• Challenging Cases from patients who do not share all the details you need, TikTok Myths you need to help your patients see through, patients who are convinced their doctor can’t find their allergies and managing poor compliance to medical practice in the age of “Dr. Google” and AI.
• Practice Expansion and Workflow Efficiency
• Using your APPs Effectively
• Co-Morbidities Impacting Outcomes
• AFRS
• Migraine & the Sinus Connection
• OSA: Changes on the horizon, medical management, and tailoring therapy to the individual
• And more

Thanks to the hard work of Rob Stachler, MD, FAAOA; Christie DeMason, MD, FAAOA; Peter Filip, MD, FAAOA; Rebecca Kamil, MD, FAAOA; Haidy Marzouk, MD FAAOA; and Arvin Rao, MD, FAAOA.  We look forward to bringing you their program and engaging in some great conversations.

Culture ties to our member base as well.  Many of you join with the goal of achieving Fellow status.  To simplify this pathway to better align with the new ABOTOHNS board-certification process, we are rolling out our new 5-year pathway.

In this new protocol, you can declare your intentions early and help gain some cost savings on the course requirements, but still pace your path over five years. 

Fellow Pathway
Initiate Candidate Status	Within 5-yrs of sitting for the written & oral exam
Initiation Cost	Registration Payment currently $950 Move from Associate or Resident member status to Fellow Candidate Status
Pathway Criteria/Flow	Join AAOA (min 1 yr active mbr)
	Fellow Exam Application noting projected year you plan to sit for the exam
	Fellow Exam Registration Payment ($950)
	Move to Fellow Candidate as member status capped at 5 yrs   Fellow Candidate status earns 5% discount on Basic and Explorers Registration Fees taken post Exam registration/status declaration (i.e, prior courses would not be rebated)
	Complete Basic within 5 yr of exam
	Complete Explorers within 5 yr of exam
	Complete at least 1 Annual within 5 yr of exam
	Complete one additional AAOA CME program (Basic, Explorers, Annual) within 5 yr of exam
	Attestation of primary treatment of 6 immunotherapy patients for at least 6 mo
	Successful completion of written exam (required before sitting for oral)
	Successful completion of oral exam
Confirmation of Fellow	ABOTOHNS certification (or DO equivalent)
	Successful completion of the above criteria; Order of completion is not as important; This new pathway allows for residents or early careers to complete the Fellow pathway while undertaking the new ABOTOHNS certification process
Failure to Complete	Failure to successfully complete either the written or oral exam components requires retake and 50% registration fee for each repeated component
	Failure to successfully complete the Fellow pathway within the 5 yrs would require re-registering to re-start the pathway and 5 yrs timeline

We encourage anyone interested in the Fellow pathway to contact Kate Chenal, Membership Coordinator at KChenal@aaoallergy.org.

To help support our member community and engagement, we are offering a “bring a colleague” program for Fellows who want to bring a colleague to the Annual Meeting or Explorers Course.  Your colleague can be a peer ENT, friend from med school, or your physician spouse. We want to give you a chance to share your AAOA experience. The other “bring a colleague” option is to bring your APP. For more information on either of these, please contact KChenal@aaoallergy.org.  Considering bringing your colleague to Tucson.