The August JASE contains an editorial commentary, “Who Is a Competent Echocardiographer?,” by two past ASE Presidents, Thomas Ryan, MD, FASE, and Susan E. Wiegers, MD, FASE. It was penned to accompany the clinical competency statement, which also runs in this issue, “2019 ACC/AHA/ASE Advanced Training Statement on Echocardiography (Revision of the 2003 ACC/AHA Clinical Competence Statement on Echocardiography): A Report of the ACC Competency Management Committee,” of which Drs. Ryan and Wiegers were co-authors. They write, “Echocardiography has become indispensable to the practice of cardiology, and as a result, most cardiologists use echocardiography in their daily practice and consider themselves competent in the field. Training in echocardiography, therefore, is an integral part of all cardiovascular fellowship programs. Achieving and maintaining competency in a widely used and dynamic area such as echocardiography are both essential and challenging. How do we define competence, and who decides whether an individual is competent?”
Other JASE articles cover new cardiac ultrasound technologies, echo in heart failure, echo in the athlete’s heart, transesophageal echo, atrial septal device interventions, and echo in children. The President’s Message by Madhav Swaminathan, MD, MMCi, FASE, “Say It Like You Mean It: Why Diversity and Inclusion Matter,” and the Sonographers’ Communication by Carol Mitchell, PhD, RDMS, RDCS, RVT, RT(R), ACS, FASE, “Grayscale Analysis of Carotid Plaque: An Overview,” would be excellent to share with up-and-coming echocardiographers and sonographers.