GME News & Notes: September

Policies and Processes

• UW and UW Medicine COVID Vaccine Requirement and Attestations: A reminder that UW Medicine requires all employees (including residents and fellows) to be fully vaccinated for COVID-19 or receive an approved exemption no later than Monday, Oct. 18, 2021, as a condition of employment.
  • The UW Medicine attestation is located on the UW Medicine Employee Website for COVID-19 Vaccine Compliance.  Note: If you were already vaccinated with UW Medicine through the employee process, no action is needed.  Thank you to everyone who has been working to get the outstanding 30 attestations resolved.
  • Additionally, UW is requiring employees (including residents and fellows) to complete the Workday attestation.  At this time, we are partnering with UW Medicine, the Integrated Service Center (ISC) and other central offices to streamline the vaccine verification process for SoM employees (including residents and fellows) who are engaged in clinical duties with UW Medicine. Faculty and other academic personnel (including Housestaff), whose vaccination status has been verified through the UW Medicine process, will not need to go through a separate visual verification process within the department.  Instead, for current employees, information will be provided by UW Medicine to the ISC and vaccine verification status will be uploaded to Workday through a mass upload. Additional information to follow. .
• UW and UW Medicine COVID symptom daily attestations: For trainees engaged in any clinical activity during a given day, they need to complete the UW Medicine attestation, NOT the UW Workday attestation. Link to the attestation: 2019 Novel Coronavirus (nCoV) Response Program (uwmedicine.org). QR codes linking to this attestation are also all over clinical sites.
• Vaccine Requirements & Attestation for non-UW Medicine Training sites:  GME has received information about vaccine requirements for non-UW Medicine training sites.  See the COVID-19 Updates page of this website for details.  If you know of others, please share them with us so we can distribute broadly.
• Access to Magnuson Health Sciences Building: The Board of Health Sciences Deans has determined that Magnuson Health Sciences building, the Foege Building, and South Campus Center will remain locked on a permanent basis.  This means:
  • You will need to use your Husky Card to access these buildings.
  • To provide access for clinic patients and events, two Magnuson Health Sciences entrances (HS Lobby and F-wing S1) will be unlocked Monday-Friday, 8:00am-5:00pm, effective September 27, 2021.
• Licensure Examination Policy: The GMEC approved revisions to the Licensure Examination Policy at the September 2021 meeting. Key changes include removal of the USMLE Step 2 (CS), COMLEX Level 2 PE, and MCCQE Part II exam requirements (exams were all discontinued/suspended indefinitely this year) and the addition of completion of USMLE Step 3 for candidates who require an eligibility exception review under the ACGME’s eligibility exception requirements.
• Reminder that the updated UW Medicine Patient Rights and Responsibilities Policy is available on the intranets for Harborview and for UW Medical Center. If you experience any type of discrimination by a patient or visitor or another staff member, you can report using the UW Medicine Bias Reporting Tool.

Program Information

• For programs that submitted GMEPAC applications for AY23, the committee met on September 13 and we will be communicating decisions as the hospitals make funding decisions. Please reach out to Cindy Hamra at hamrac@u.edu with any questions.
• The GMEC approved the following new program directors at the September meeting. Both appointments are awaiting ACGME approval:
  • Lisa Koch,  Gynecologic/Breast Pathology
  • David C. Mauchley, Congenital Cardiac Surgery
• Please join us in welcoming the following new program administrators:
  • • Jenelle Kirschner, Cardiothoracic Anesthesiology
    • Lauren Stoll, Child Neurology

Events of Interest

• Due to high census in UW Medicine Hospitals, many of our clinical services are offering moonlighting opportunities. If you are interested, please complete the Moonlighting Interest Survey and make sure you get approval from your program director, consistent with the Policy on Working Outside of the Training Program (including Moonlighting).  Use the Outside Work Request Forms to request approval.  Please send completed forms to Angela James (ang226@uw.edu) in the GME Office.  GME will share the list of interested moonlighters with each service.   At this time, the services will reach out to share opportunities.
• GME’s Family Planning & Fertility for Resident Physicians event is Thursday, September 30, from 6:00 – 7:45pm.  All residents, fellows and guests are encouraged to attend. Register here.
• Registration for our Fall Program Director Development Series (PDDS) is now open.  Please register here.  This season we are excited to be bringing you information about Standing up to Microaggressions, the Washington Physicians Health Program (WPHP), and the Peer Support Program.  Please see the agenda for additional details on these important topics.
• UW Center for Child & Family Well-Being Courses: The UW Center for Child & Family Well-Being has several upcoming courses in September that are open to all: Mindful Self-Compassion, Finding Calm – Strengthening Bonds Through Self-Kindness, RAIN, and Tools for Teens: Stress Management and Emotional Resilience. For more information, please visit their website.
• The next GME Outreach Event will be on Tuesday, October 12, at Seattle Children’s Hospital. More information to come.

Projects and Resources

• Recruitment Resources for Programs and Applicants: Check out the GME website for helpful recruitment resources for programs and applicants, including:
  • Prospective Residents & Fellows: Videos for prospective applicants, letter to applicants from Dr. Joyner, eligibility and recruitment policies, resources on appointments, salary and benefits including links to the RFPU-NW contract, RFPA, salary schedule, and benefits at a glance guide.
  • Recruitment Resources: Required notifications to applicants, eligibility requirements, application and interview tools, EDI resources, resources and best practices for virtual recruitment.
  • Recordings of Fall 2020 events:
    • Fall 2020 PDDS: Implicit Bias & Candidate Selection and Navigating Vulnerability & Shame in Medical Education
    • July 23, 2020 PAAC Workshop: Connecting with Applicants: AY21 Recruitment Season
    • June 9, 2020 Program Administrator Meeting: 2020-2021 Recruitment Season
• NIH Loan Repayment Program: NIH will help repay student loan debt to encourage outstanding health professionals in the pursuit of research careers in biomedical or biobehavioral research careers. Loan repayment benefits are in addition to the institutional salary received for research. The LRP online application is open this year from September 1 to November 18.  More details are available on UW applicants to NIH: Loan Repayment Programs
• We are sharing the following (excerpted) guidance from Academic Affairs to UWSOM Medical Students pursuant to the recent the Coalition for Physician Accountability (CoPA) recommendations:
  • Earlier this year, CoPA recommended that medical students should do only one away rotation in a specialty to which they are applying, and the UWSOM, like other schools in the country, has adhered to this recommendation.
  • CoPA has also announced their recommendation that all interviews for residency and fellowship during the 2021-2022 application cycle again be conducted virtually.  This decision was made because of concerns regarding the delta variant of Covid, and future variants that may pose risks and cause inequity and disruptions.  They have also recommended that the medical education community assess the value of virtual interviews along with concerns to make recommendations for future interview seasons.  You can read more information here.
  • UWSOM graduating students did very well during the 2021 Match and were well-prepared for virtual interviews.  Our career advising team, including Sarah Thomson, Linh Ngo, Tonja Brown and the specialty career advisors, are ready to help you prepare for virtual interviews for this year.  Each of you will have a mock interview with a faculty member as a core part of your preparation. Please review the resources for preparing for virtual interviews here.
• Child Care Resources
  • Child care assistance for those living or working in King County: Families who live or work in King County, and who were negatively impacted by COVID-19, may qualify for financial support from King County’s Child Care Assistance Fund.
  • Receive priority access to child care placements at Bright Horizons: Benefits-eligible UW employees and students receive enrollment priority at all Bright Horizons child care locations nationwide.
  • More information about these programs is here.
• The Fall 2021 Well-Being Index (WBI) survey window is from September 1 – October 15.  All residents and fellows are encouraged to participate in this 7-question survey.  Participation can help you understand your overall well-being compared to other residents/fellows across UW and the nation and provides access to resources.  All data is completely anonymous and your personal information and individual scores are private and will not be shared with UW GME, UW Medicine, or your program.  More information available on the GME website.
• GME Website Feedback: Please take a few minutes to tell us about your experience using the GME website, good or bad, so we can better understand what is important to you, what we are doing well, and where there are areas where we need to make improvements. You can access the Feedback link here or on any of the page footers on our website.

People

• Nashwa Abdulsalam, Cardiology fellow, is lead author of “Gender Differences in the Pursuit of Cardiac Electrophysiology Training in North America” in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
• Omeed Alipour, Gastroenterology fellow, is lead author of “Systematic review and meta-analysis: real-world data rates of deep remission with anti-TNFα in inflammatory bowel disease” in BMC Gastroenterology and “The assessment of sarcopenia using psoas muscle thickness per height is not predictive of post-operative complications in IBD” in the Scandinavian Journal of Gastroenterology.
• Jennifer Best, Associate Dean, GME, was interviewed for “Meeting Your Match in the Virtual Space: Tips and Advice for Interviewing for the 2022 Residency Match” by the Macy Foundation.
• GME is excited to welcome our new wellness counselor, Patty Long-Brohm to the team! Information about how to schedule counseling with Patty is on our GME Wellness Service page.
• Frederick Chen, Director, Family Medicine Residency Network (FMRN), and Judith Pauwels, Associate Director, FMRN, authored “Rural Residency Training as a Strategy to Address Rural Health Disparities: Barriers to Expansion and Possible Solutions” in JGME.
• Dipti Chrastka, GME Wellness Director, has joined the board of directors for Sound Health.
• GME is excited to welcome Jasmine Duong, who started on September 13 as an Accreditation Specialist. Jasmine recently graduated from UW School of Public Health where she completed her master’s in public administration. She will be supporting GME accreditation in the management of affiliation agreements, and in the coordination and monitoring of various accreditation requirements.
• Erik Kimble, Hematology-Oncology fellow, is lead author and Ryan Cassaday, associate professor, Hematology, is senior author of “Antibody and cellular immunotherapies for acute lymphoblastic leukemia in adults” in Leukemia & Lymphoma.
• Michelle Pengshung, Nephrology fellow, is lead author of “Arterial Stiffness is Independently Associated with Acute Kidney Injury in SPRINT” in the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.
• Perrin Romine, Hematology-Oncology fellow, is lead author and Hannah Linden, Medical Oncology professor, is senior author of “18F-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) PET or 18F-fluorothymidine (FLT) PET to assess early response to aromatase inhibitors (AI) in women with ER+ operable breast cancer in a window-of-opportunity study” in Breast Cancer Research. DOM co-authors are Lanell Peterson and Jennifer Specht.
• Lisa Vande Vusse, APD, Internal Medicine is the author of “Ninety-six Paces of Privilege” in JAMA.

Do you have a concern to report to GME? This QR code will take you to our Report A Concern form!