Family physicians are much more than medical service providers. In fact, “they often get to know families better than nearly anyone else outside of the family,” according to Corban Wehr of the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP). “These doctors see parents as well as their children and follow children as they grow up and have kids of their own. There is a deep, trusting established relationship that takes shape, which is so important.” As I spoke with and got to know the dedicated team at AAFP, I saw another established relationship at work: the collaborative working relationship between the members of CDC’s National Partner Network (NPN).
FASD United is spotlighting each of the organizations that are part of the NPN and in our latest piece, we are proud to feature the AAFP, a key member of the NPN that is advancing the FASD field by ensuring that family physicians are FASD-informed and empowered to work effectively with clients impacted by prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) and substance use disorder (SUD).
The NPN is a collaborative coalition of organizations dedicated to advancing key goals, including reducing PAE and substance use, enhancing support services and access to care, and improving the identification and health of children and families affected by FASDs. As a proud participant in this collaborative effort from 2022 to 2026, FASD United is excited to contribute to public education on FASD and prenatal substance exposure alongside these exceptional partners.
I spoke with two incredible members of the team: Corban Wehr, Clinical & Health Policy Strategist, and Aftan Jameson, Program Strategist at the Center for Women’s Health.
A team dedicated to families in need and advancing public health
Corban is a dedicated champion of public health, working in the division of Education, Science, and Health of the Public at AAFP. She has been at AAFP for two and a half years and previously worked in direct care helping families connect with a variety of needed resources, including employment resources, medical care, and support for developmental issues for their children. “I loved this hands-on care with children with behavioral differences and I really value that experience with neurodiverse populations,” Corban says, adding, “When I started at AAFP, I was excited to join the FASD project because this work really fits with my experience. It’s been great to be part of this work almost from the start.”
Aftan Jameson works in the Center for Women’s Health, as the longest serving strategist on the FASD project in her division, coming up on almost three years with AAFP. “I began in phase 2 of the project and this is actually my first federally-funded grant project,” Aftan says. Before joining the AAFP team, Aftan specialized in tobacco cessation and alcohol and cannabis education at the health center of the University of Kansas, remarking that, “I am excited to apply my background in substance use issues to this critical topic of FASD.”
Corban’s experience working directly with families showed her how important it is for families to have access to their medical care. The first step towards this access is a family physician. “I’ve seen on the patient side how important these resources are,” Corban says. “Family physicians work with families across the entire lifespan. That trusted relationship and family history is so important.” When it comes to FASD, that context that physicians have for families and their history supports education prior to a diagnosis, as physicians get the opportunity to give families the resources they need on a regular basis and mitigate risks.
AAFP is supporting and empowering the professionals who take care of us.
“I see up close how AAFP is so dedicated to supporting their members and giving them what they need so that physicians can focus their time on the wellness of their patients and healthy communities,” Corban says, adding, “What I most appreciate about AAFP is how much the organization cares about making sure physicians are taken care of so they can take care of their populations. This has such wonderful ripple effects.” We are indeed healthier as a country due to the many resources provided by AAFP as an organization that is dedicated to taking care of the people that take care of us.
Aftan spoke of being particularly proud of how strategic AAFP is in how the team approaches the work. “We truly know what our family physicians need because we empower our subject matter experts, for example by deciding what screening tool to use for alcohol SBIRT.” Aftan spoke about the team’s wide range of educational materials, including articles published in journals and educational videos, as well as resources for medical billing and coding. “I think we have done a great job of creating the particular resources that family physicians need, and I believe we have hit every single box, and we continue to be led by our incredible subject matter experts,” Aftan emphasizes.
An expanded focus on education and training
Corban is excited about her and her team’s current work on the development of a 2-part CME activity, stating that, “education is a big project that we are focused on this year.” A live webinar takes place on August 13 (mark your calendars!) and is designed to be useful for a wide audience, even as it is being developed for family physicians. The webinar will offer a foundational knowledge in FASD. This webinar is an expansion of a prior online CME on addressing prenatal substance use.
In addition to the webinar, the CME will feature a translation to practice that will guide physicians on how to implement the foundational knowledge of FASD in their practice and what tangible steps can be taken to improve patient care and outcomes, geared toward medical staff and physicians. AAFP’s education team is working with Dr. Jeffrey D. Quinlan to develop the content of the webinar on translation to practice and an important evaluation piece that will inform what physicians are accomplishing and how to best measure that progress. Corban and Aftan are both excited to promote the webinar and CME through the NPN and we invite readers to please spread the word.
A wealth of resources to empower family physicians
AAFP has developed an incredible portfolio of resources and materials that are making a real difference in families lives by empowering their physicians with the knowledge and skills they need to be FASD-informed. AAFP has a practice manual on addressing alcohol use, as well as a billing and coding resource for reimbursement for alcohol screening.
The team is proud to have added FASD-specific resources to AAFP’s powerful Neighborhood Navigator tool. The navigator is a great resource for patients who can access a range of important resources like housing and food assistance. By including FASD-specific resources and substance use care resources to this tool, patients who are looking for resources for FASD can find supports in other areas that may be needed. “We are taking a holistic approach to supporting families that is multi-layered,” Corban says, adding, “We know that often those families with FASD may need support in other areas for their children, and the Neighborhood Navigator is a great place to find help.”
Corban and Aftan make a special point to be sure to call out AAFP’s chapters, who help with putting their resources together. AAFP chapters also disseminate and share many of these resources with patients, including the organization’s resource on training available for clinicians related to alcohol use during pregnancy. The team shares FASD facts through articles published by FamilyDoctor.org, including on FASD and alcohol misuse.
Enthusiastic feedback and responsive communications about cannabis risk
The incredible resources and work of AAFP is making waves and eliciting a strong response from family physicians all across the country. Aftan was blown away by the enthusiastic response she got at AAFP’s family medicine conference, FMX, which is the organization’s big annual conference, with the largest audience. “We had a big exhibit booth,” Aftan recalled, “and tons of family physicians go around to different booths. When all these doctors saw our booth and saw it was from AAFP, they were so appreciative. They told us how wonderful it is to see us as an organization here in person and they asked us what we are working on.”
“It was such a great experience to have this opportunity to hear the positive feedback. Family physicians were so enthusiastic to talk to us. They really wanted to hear about our work.” When the AAFP team told the doctors about their work with alcohol exposure during pregnancy, the feedback they got was that along with alcohol, what these physicians were seeing in their practice was a lot of cannabis use during pregnancy and had questions about that. “It was an overwhelming response,” Aftan says, “I would say, perhaps 8 out of 10 people that came up to us were telling us that they were having so many conversations happening in regards to the use of cannabis.”
The team took this feedback and modified their scope of work for year 2. The timing was perfect, as the conference took place in the fall of 2023 as the team was wrapping up year 1 and deciding on year 2 priorities. AAFP’s subject matter experts, including Dr. Roger Zoorob and Dr. Jeffrey D. Quinlan, developed a medical resource for physicians in the Family Practice Management (FPM) journal on cannabis use during pregnancy, as well as a podcast episode on the topic.
“While we continued to talk about the risks of alcohol use, we are able to expand our scope to talk about the risks of cannabis,” Aftan explains. “We worked to meet the need as it was expressed to us and now the education component of our work is focusing more and more on the topic of cannabis. I think we were able to identify a need in our community and meet the need successfully.”
The power of resource sharing in the NPN
According to Corban, “being part of the NPN and working with CDC has been fantastic,” adding, “We get so much out of being able to access to resources from FASD United and the other organizations, such as ORAU, including the fantastic social media content and the great living experience videos.” The AAFP team sees that different partners may have different areas of strength and that everyone together contributing their expertise makes us all stronger. “The collaboration between our organizations is at an all-time importance right now. It’s so great to have this established relationship with the NPN,” Corban adds.
The AAFP team loves working with the other national partners on FASD resources and getting the opportunity to share feedback. For example, Corban points out that, “AAP being able to focus on FASD-related products for pediatricians helps us at AAFP because these still apply to family physicians, so by sharing these resources it helps us. It’s great to provide our feedback from a family medicine perspective on their resources that they are developing, so that the products reflect a wide range of perspectives.”
Specifically, Corban appreciated collaborating with AAP on their work developing their hospital aid tool, saying, “AAP saw that the perspective of our subject matter experts makes their resources stronger. Also, it is so helpful when we at AAFP are developing resources to get feedback from AAP and ACOG and others. We are able to make all of our resources that much stronger. The sharing of knowledge benefits the FASD community that we are all working to support with our work.”
The impact of seeing each other’s passion face-to-face
Aftan expressed a deep appreciation for the NPN for the opportunity to collaborate and pointed out the value of the partnership being multi-year “so that we can pivot the work as needed to meet the needs of the community. AAFP has great resources, and the team recognizes the NPN as being “such a valuable resource in itself, by unifying messages across organizations, which makes our work go farther by amplifying our collective voice.”
Corban emphasized the value of the human connection aspect to her work, being able to talk directly with physicians and hear that the work is important to them and hear what else is needed so that AAFP knows to provide what physicians actually need. Corban says, “When we were all in Atlanta together at the CDC with the NPN members, it was so great, everyone joining together, has been a fantastic experience. We were able to take back conversations from partners and use them to inform our work to better support family physicians and our chapters and the FASD community as a whole.”
The face-to-face communication within the NPN is so meaningful and makes a huge difference, for the team to see the passion and energy that each partner has for the work. “It keeps us energized, it’s really impactful to hear from a community around you,” Corban says, adding, “Hearing what the partners are all working on is so great. Knowing that we have a community around us that we want to keep supporting, that supports us while we support them is a big part of what keeps me going.”
Making a real difference for families in need
Aftan recognizes how important it is to always remember why we do this work and why we’re in the room, that families truly need these resources. “Family physicians are unique because they have the opportunity to see the pregnant person and the child as well,” Aftan says. “Family physicians are able to treat an entire family. They have a patient history and a rapport that others may not have, so we at AAFP have to be thoughtful about the resources we produce for these doctors. Because family physicians have that unique experience, it makes it more important than ever for us to continue this work as a team.”
Corban reflects on getting to know each of the individuals working for the different partner organizations and how valuable that is to the work. “We have the opportunity to learn more about each other and their context, what each person’s individual history is related to this FASD work and what value and knowledge base each person brings. It has been fantastic to be part of the NPN, we at AAFP have enjoyed it very much. The collaboration is resulting in a healthier and happier FASD community.”
*This project is supported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as part of a financial assistance award funded by CDC/HHS. The contents are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement, by CDC/HHS, or the U.S. Government.