Dear GME Community,
Cindy Hamra Associate Dean, GME
I’m pleased to share several great educational events and opportunities in the November News & Notes, including the excellent Optimizing MedHub Lunch & Learn, 2024 ACGME conference registration, a new 2024 GME educational series and the November PA meeting recording.
This article from the UW Medicine Newsroom focuses on practice in rural areas: Docs trained in rural areas tend to practice in rural areas. Our Department of Family Medicine has a Chelan Rural Training Program that is designed to train physicians for rural practice.
November is Native American Heritage Month! This article in The Huddle has information about the history, cultures and achievements of Native American communities, including articles about Northwest Native Art and Native American contributions to public health as well as a guide to events and heritage sites in Seattle.
Finally, sending off Khrystine Buccat, our amazing GME Appointment Manager, as she transitions to the Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology as the new Maternal-Fetal Medicine Division Administrator. Khrystine’s last day in GME is November 22. We wish her all the best and will be posting the opening shortly!
Thank you,
Cindy
Policies and Processes
- COVID Vaccination are Required for All Current and Future Trainees at Seattle Children’s – Due by 12/11/2023. All residents, fellows, and medical students rotating or have access to Seattle Children’s after 12/11/2023 are required to have full COVID vaccination, including the new 2023-2024 Monovalent COVID-19 mRNA Vaccine, or have request ed an exception prior to working at Seattle Children’s. The sponsoring program/institution will be responsible for ensuring trainee compliance. For more information, trainees should go to CHILD (Seattle Children’s intranet).
- The holiday season is often a time of giving by grateful patients, vendors, and other outside organizations. State employees within UW Medicine are governed by the Washington State Ethics in Public Service Act with regard to the gifts they may accept and how they may redirect gifts they cannot accept. Common questions about gifts from patients and other external sources (including food and beverages) and other related topics are answered in the Gifts from External Sources FAQs on the UW Medicine Compliance website. Additional information is available on the Internal Audit website.
- Explore benefits options at UW Benefits & Resource Fairs (including virtual option)
Learn about your benefits options in advance of open enrollment (November 1 – December 15) at one of the UW onsite benefits fairs, or an ongoing virtual fair. - A reminder that residents and fellows are considered essential personnel who are expected to report for duty; please see guidance from Residency and Fellowship Position Appointment (RFPA) Agreement 2023-2024 and Executive Order 27: Suspended Operations Policy.
- Remember that trainees who are members of the RFPU-NW are entitled to one (1) paid personal holiday per calendar year. If unused in the calendar year, the personal holiday is forfeit, and it is not paid at separation. It is the employee’s responsibility to schedule the personal holiday before December 31st. If before the end of the calendar year the employee requests the use of their personal holiday in accordance with the employer’s time off or leave procedures and the employer denies the request, the employee is entitled to carry over the personal holiday to the next calendar year. Please see complete information in Article 12 of the RFPU-NW Contract.
Program Information
- Welcome New Program Administrators:
- Ruby Tang, Obstetric Anesthesiology, Liver Transplant Anesthesiology, Regional Anesthesiology
- Serena Wong, Neuromuscular Medicine, Vascular Neurology
- The GMEC has approved appointment of the following new program directors; ACGME appointments require Review Committee (RC) confirmation:
- Chris Burke, Cardiothoracic Surgery and Thoracic Surgery – Integrated (Interim)
- Paige Keasler, Obstetric Anesthesiology
- Matthew Phelps, Breast Imaging (non-ACGME)
- Porshia Underwood, Obstetrics and Gynecology
- The ACGME has a weekly e-Communication. If you wish to receive it, email ACGMECommunications@acgme.org.
Events of Interest
- GME Lunch & Learns
- Registration for the ACGME Meaning in Medicine 2024 Annual Education Conference is open! The conference is scheduled to take place in Orlando, Florida at the Rosen Shingle Creek Resort March 7-9, 2024. More information can be found on the conference website. Support for meeting attendance is ensured by the clinical chair in every new Program Director Appointment Letter.
- Please save the date(s)! The GME Office is pleased to invite program leadership (PDs, APDs, PAs) to participate in an educational series that we will be offering throughout 2024. We have designed this series in response to cross-program challenges as observed in our ACGME surveys and in our work supporting programs and trainees. See 11/9 email from Cindy Hamra for more information.
- The University of Washington School of Medicine is sponsoring the 2024 Graduate Medical Education (GME) Summit. Please Save the Date to join us on April 25-26, 2024, in Anchorage, Alaska. Registration will open in December.
- Other GME Events can be found on our calendar.
Projects and Resources
Please review the GME Annual Program Timeline for important dates for the months of November and December including: NRMP Match deadlines, fall Milestones reporting, semi-annual Procedures Certification entry in MedHub, ERAS preseason setup (Dec Cycle), and AAMC/GME Track GME Census deadlines.- Presentation from Nov 14 Program Administrator meeting is now available on the Program Administrator Meetings page.
- The GME Office is supporting a new project called the Names & Pronunciations Initiative, which aims to not only highlight the importance of name pronunciations, but also improve communication by providing physical badges (for those who want one) which include users’ written phonetic name pronunciation. Anyone interested in learning more about the project or who wants to order a pronunciation badge can do so at: https://www.names-pronunciations-initiative.com/. If you receive a badge for someone not in your program or if you have any questions, please email the project lead, Sudiptho (UW MS4).
- The WWAMI Institute for Simulation in Healthcare (WISH) is the simulation-based education program serving all of UW Medicine, since 2005. WISH is undergoing some exciting developments and is seeking input from all users (as well as would-be future users) to help inform strategic plans for the next 5 years. By Friday, December 15th, please take a few moments to provide your responses around both current and anticipated future simulation-based utilization, and services that would benefit your training programs in the coming years. For additional comments or questions, please reach out to WISH Associate Director, Megan Sherman or Chief of the Division for Healthcare Simulation Science, Dr. Rob Sweet.
- Every year, the UW School of Medicine Alumni Association recognizes exceptional alumni with a series of awards. We encourage UW School of Medicine alumni, faculty, staff and other professional colleagues to nominate alumni for one or more of our awards. All alumni who received a degree from, or completed residency or fellowship training in, a program administered by the UW School of Medicine or one of our academic departments are eligible. Visit the website for full descriptions of the Distinguished Alumni Award, the Alumni Humanitarian Award, the Alumni Service Award and the Alumni Early Achievement Award. Nominations for the 2024 awards are open; you may submit nominations until December 31, 2023 here.
- The GME Office has posted an updated letter from Dr. Joyner for prospective residents and fellows to our GME Prospective Residents & Fellows page.
- Based on feedback from our community, in AY23 the GME Office developed Total Compensation sample statements for trainees at the R1 and R4 levels, meant to reflect incoming residents and incoming fellows, respectively. The R1 & R4 Total Compensation sample statements have been updated for AY24. These resources are posted to the GME Prospective Residents and Fellows page under Compensation.
- The Leave of Absence webpage contains LOA planning information and resources along with an intake form to contact GME for leave planning assistance: Leave Planning Submission Form.
People
- Ryan Abe, Internal Medicine Health Equity Pathway Director, is senior author of “Equity M&M — Adaptation of the Morbidity and Mortality Conference to Analyze and Confront Structural Inequity in Internal Medicine” in the Journal of General Internal Medicine. Department of Medicine co-authors are Hannah Oren and Helen Jack.
- Christopher Alawode, OEM resident, is featured in “How occupational medicine physicians support workers” from the Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences website.
- Joey Chiang, resident, Internal Medicine, is co-author of “Homelessness and Incidence and Causes of Sudden Death: Data From the POST SCD Study” in JAMA Internal Medicine.
- John Choe, Internal Medicine Residency Associate Program Director, is featured in the latest faculty spotlight from the Department of Medicine. Read his faculty spotlight on their news site.
- A cornerstone of the VA’s efforts to strengthen and diversify the VA scientific work force, the Summer Research Program offers research experiences to Veterans, children of Veterans, and underrepresented students. The 3-year pilot program started in June 2022 at 21 VA sites across the country. Co-directed by Lindsey Anderson, acting assistant professor, and Jose Garcia, Geriatric Medicine Research Pathway Program Director, the Seattle site primarily provides students with experience in research related to age/cancer-related declines in muscle mass and function (human, animal, and benchwork) and traumatic brain injury (TBI) related hormone dysfunction (human). Learn more on the Department of Medicine news site.
- Mark Harrast, Sports Medicine PM&R Program Director, is featured in “What Runners Need to Know About the Immune System” and “3 Simple Ways to Help Runner’s Knee” from Right as Rain.
- Carrie Ho, fellow, is lead author, and Stephen Smith, associate professor (Hematology and Oncology) is senior author of “Pembrolizumab with R-CHOP in Previously Untreated DLBCL: Sustained, High Efficacy and Safety with Long-Term Follow-Up” in Clinical Lymphoma, Myeloma & Leukemia. Department of Medicine co-authors are Ajay Gopal, Brian Till, Mazyar Shadman, Ryan Lynch, Andrew Cowan, Heather Rasmussen, Chaitra Ujjani and Ryan Cassaday.
- Vishesh Kapur, Sleep Medicine Program Director, is featured in “UW sleep expert among those pushing federal leaders for permanent standard time” from Kiro 7.
- Ayesha Khader, resident, Internal Medicine is lead author and Pavan Bhatraju, associate professor (Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine) is senior author of “The Interaction of Acute Kidney Injury with Resuscitation Strategy in Sepsis: A Secondary Analysis of a Multicenter, Phase 3, Randomized Trial (CLOVERS)” in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. Department of Medicine co-authors are Leila Zelnick, Neha Sathe, Bryan Kestenbaum, Jonathan Himmelfarb, and Nicholas Johnson
- Emily Liang, fellow, is lead author, and Jordan Gauthier, associate professor (Hematology and Oncology) is senior author of “Factors associated with long-term outcomes of CD19 CAR T-cell therapy for relapsed/refractory CLL” in Blood Advances. Department of Medicine co-authors are Aya Albittar, Jennifer Huang, Alexandre Hirayama, Erik Kimble, Andrew Portuguese, Aude Chapuis, Mazyar Shadman, Brian Till, Ryan Cassaday, Filippo Milano, Hans-Peter Kiem, Stanley Riddell, Cameron Turtle and David Maloney.
- Leo Morales, Assistant Dean for Healthcare Equity and Quality, is this year’s recipient of the Secretary’s Award from the Washington state Department of Health. The Award recognizes the strong work occurring around Washington state in the field of public health and links that work with the dedicated people working every single day to protect and promote the health and well-being of everyday Washingtonians. Dr. Morales was honored for his work protecting and promoting the health of Latino communities in Washington state and across the Pacific Northwest. Learn more on the Department of Medicine news site.
- Sarah Prager, Program Director, Complex Family Planning, is featured in “How Telemedicine Makes Abortion More Accessible” from The Huddle.
- Ganesh Raghu, Interstitial Lung Disease Program Director, is senior author of “Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis: aligning murine models to clinical trials in humans” in the Lancet Respiratory Medicine.
- May Reed, Geriatric Medicine Associate Program Director, is PI for the TRIAD study within the Dog Aging Project. TRIAD (Test of Rapamycin in Aging Dogs) is a clinical trial currently underway across the United States that seeks to assess the effects of rapamycin on health and aging in dogs. Learn more about the project.
- Ginny Ryan, Reproductive, Endocrinology and Infertility Program Director, is featured in “Updated ‘infertility’ definition could help more hopeful LGBTQ+ parents in Washington” from Axios Seattle.
- Laura Quinnan, Medical Director for the UWMC – Northwest Campus, received the Hospitalist of the Year award at the recent American College of Physicians Washington state chapter meeting.