GME News & Notes: March 2025

Dear GME Community,

Happy Match Day!  We are excited for our program and look forward to welcoming the 500+ incoming residents and fellows who will join UW Medicine and UW School of Medicine in a few short months.  This time of year, the amazing GME Housestaff Affairs team ramps up onboarding, working closely with program leadership, to ensure our incoming trainees are ready to start.  We share information on our Incoming Residents & Fellows page.

The GME Office has developed a GME Federal Policy and Resources page to share links to important UW Medicine resources and to provide GME-specific guidance.  Please let me know you have questions that are not addressed on the page.

Thanks to the GME Team for celebrating Thank a Resident Day on February 28, by offering lunches and thanks to our trainees at UW Medical Center, Harborview Medical Center, Seattle Children’s Hospital and the VA Puget Sound.  Thanks also to our Wellness Counselors for leading this event.

Please see March News & Notes for information about onboarding, events, projects and a new Wellness Corner.

Thanks,

Cindy

Policies and Processes

• Graduation certificates can be ordered via CertMaker beginning March 10th. Please be sure terminations are completed in MedHub prior to placing your order, no more than 120 days in advance of the appointment end date. Refer to the email sent out by Angela James on February 21st for additional guidance. If you have any questions, reach out to Angela at ang226@uw.edu.
• Some important information about appointment and credentialing for AY26:
  • AY26 Appointments: Information regarding onboarding and reappointment guidelines is available on our Appointments & Credentialing page.
  • The 2025-2026 Residency and Fellowship Position Appointment (RFPA) Agreement, which will take effect July 1, 2025, has been released and is now available on the Policies and Procedures, Current Residents and Fellows, and Prospective Residents and Fellows pages of the GME website.
• Meeting and away conferences that take place during VA assignments require pre-approval from the corresponding site director and designated education officer. Please submit these requests to the VA no later than 30 days before leave occurs.
• New Non-ACGME Programs: Is your department planning to launch a new non-ACGME fellowship program?  Visit the Non-ACGME Program Resources page for resources including the application for new non-ACGME programs.
• Best Practices for Recruiting and Supporting International Medical Graduates: The GMEC IMG Task Force has developed best practices and resources for programs to reduce barriers to recruitment of IMGs which is now available on the Recruitment Resources page of the GME website under Application and Recruitment: UW > Recruiting and Supporting International Medical Graduates: Best Practices.

Program Information

• Welcome New Program Administrators:
  • Drue Johnson: Complex Family Planning, Gynecologic Oncology, Maternal-Fetal Medicine, Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility
• The GMEC has approved appointment of the following new program directors; ACGME appointments require Review Committee confirmation:
  • Yasaman Fatemi, Pediatric Infectious Diseases
• UW Labor Relations creates recaps of bargaining sessions between the UW and RFPU-CIR on the Labor Relations’ Negotiation Updates Page.
• The ACGME has a weekly e-Communication. If you wish to receive it, email ACGMECommunications@acgme.org.

Events of Interest

• GME Lunch & Learns
  • March 20: Annual Program Evaluations (APEs); slides and recording now available
  • April 17: TBD
  • May 15: GMEPAC AY27
• Program Administrators – please join us for the following events:
  • Thalamus Q&A Drop in Sessions on Tuesday, March 25 from 3:00 – 4:00 pm on Zoom (see March 12 email from gmeevents@uw.edu for details).
  • Program Administrator Meeting (ACGME Conference Updates and Thalamus Q&A) on Tuesday, April 8 from 8:30 – 9:30 am on Zoom (stay tuned for invite from gmeevents@uw.edu).
• The March 2025 Educator Development for GME Excellence (EDGE) session is Tuesday, March 25, 2025 from 10:30 am and 12:00 pm and will focus on “Supporting Trainee Disability Accommodations” with Hayley Fisher, UW GME. Registration is required; if you would like to attend but have not registered please contact Amanda Easton (amande@uw.edu) and Emilie Bryant (ebry1616@uw.edu).
• Stop by a Spring Well-Being Fair (thanks to the Whole U and CARE4U) at UWMC-Northwest and UWMC-Montlake. Resources and well-being tools for you!
• Clinical & non-clinical volunteers are needed for the upcoming Seattle/King County Clinic from April 24 – 27, 2025 at Seattle Center. The Clinic is celebrating its tenth anniversary and provides free dental, vision, medical & social services for 3000+ people in need. Review the Seattle/King County Clinic assignment descriptions for more information on the requirements and duties of each position, including information for students and residents.
• Program Faculty and Administrators – the University of Washington has been collaborating with Oregon Health & Sciences University, Madigan Army Medical Center, and the and the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education to co-sponsor a highly engaging and experiential workshop on assessment in medical education. Registration for the PNW assessment conference is now open! Space is limited. Please feel free to forward to any of your colleagues in GME. Looking forward to seeing you in Portland!
• Other GME Events can be found on the GME calendar.

Projects and Resources

• Please review the GME Annual Program Timeline for important dates in March and April.
• Reference Guide for IMG and Foreign National Residents and Fellows: This guide, developed by the GMEC IMG Task Force, addresses questions received by programs and the GME Office from incoming and current trainees.  Members of the task force involved in developing this document include IMG residents and fellows, program directors, program administrators and program faculty.  The guide is posted on the Visas, Current Residents and Fellows and Incoming Residents and Fellows pages on the GME website.
• 2025 ACGME Surveys Open February 10: The ACGME Resident/Fellow and Faculty Surveys run from February 10 to April 4. This year, early participation is especially important due to union-related discussions closer to the deadline. Verify ADS rosters are accurate, with 70% response rates required (or 100% for smaller programs). Resources are available on the ACGME website and from the January GME Lunch & Learn.
• Thank you to everyone who attended the Scheduling Workshop Series earlier this month! A lot of content was covered – from billing and scheduling foundations, to conferences, clinics, and LOA processes – and we appreciated your attendance, engagement, and great questions. Each of the workshop recordings and links to other helpful sites are available on the GME MedHub page under “Scheduling Resources”. As always, please reach out to Allison Shults (ashults@uw.edu) or Jessica Kruse (jlkruse@uw.edu) with any MedHub questions.
• GME Finance is pleased to share an educational video designed to help your team better understand Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) and its relationship to days scheduled in Medhub. This resource offers guidance on converting FTE to days, which we hope will serve as a valuable tool for your program management. Please visit the GME Finance page to access the “GME FTE 101 Video” and “FTE 101 Calculations.”
• For trainees:
  • This short survey will help UW HR Worklife better understand the challenges and needs of UW families juggling childcare outside standard hours. Your input is incredibly valuable!
  • UW Medicine is developing our Healthcare Equity Blueprint 3.0 to create a more just and inclusive healthcare system. This is your opportunity to share your experiences and perspectives in a focus group discussion about healthcare equity at UW Medicine. We would like to recruit 8 to 18 Trainees to participate in this process. This would be purely voluntary, so ideally it’s people who are interested in supporting healthcare equity oriented work, including yourselves! Choose Your Session:
    • March 31, 1 – 2:30 pm: https://washington.zoom.us/meeting/register/EXW4sPAVQ7uurpEHk6oDbA
    • April 7, 1 – 2:30pm: https://washington.zoom.us/meeting/register/pfAsc69ARwOEVLIJb40ifA
    • April 11, 12 – 1:30pm: https://washington.zoom.us/meeting/register/dmTLn7nJQjmBMOlJrYMtsg
    • Option 4: If none of these time slots work for you, but you’re still interested in participating in the Blueprint 3.0 somehow, indicate interest on this list!­
• The UW Medicine Peer to Peer program is seeking nominations from residents and fellows who may be interested in becoming trained peer supporters. Submit your Peer to Peer program nomination.

People

• The GME Office is excited to welcome two new team members:
  • Menglu Zhang has joined the GME Finance Team as the Financial Analyst
  • Gwen Zellers has joined the Accred/Ed Team as Program Manager, Teaching and Learning
• Moe Hagman, Internal Medicine Boise Program Director, is featured in “The Power of Mentorship” from The Huddle.
• Christopher Knight, Internal Medicine Associate Program Director, is the 2025 recipient of the Edithe J. Levit Distinguished Service Award from the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME), in recognition of his enduring commitment and contributions to the organization and assessment in medical education.
• Natasha Hunter, assistant professor, is lead author and Hannah Linden, Hematology and Oncology Associate Program Director, is senior author of “Fluoroestradiol (FES) and Fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) PET imaging in patients with ER+, HER2-positive or HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer” in Breast Cancer Research. Department of Medicine co-authors are Lanell Peterson, Jennifer Specht, William Gwin, Shaveta Vinayak, and Nancy Davidson.
• The latest Department of Medicine (DOM) faculty spotlight is on Radhika Narla, associate professor (Metabolism, Endocrinology and Nutrition), associate program director for subspecialty medicine for the Internal Medicine Residency Program, and member of the DOM Gender Equity Council. Learn more about her on the DOM news site.
• Linnaea Schuttner, assistant professor (General Internal Medicine) is lead author of “Perceived Connections Between Personal Values and Health in High-Risk Patients with Multimorbidity: A Qualitative Study” in the Journal of General Internal Medicine. Department of Medicine co-authors are Karin Nelson (Health Services Research and Development Program Director), Scott Hagan, and Katherine Ritchey.
• Yue-Harn Ng, Transplant Nephrology Program Director, is co-author of “Kidney Transplant Fast Track and Likelihood of Waitlisting and Transplant: A Nonrandomized Clinical Trial” in JAMA Internal Medicine.
• Hongyang (Jo) Pi, senior fellow (Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine) received the American Heart Association (AHA) Career Development Award, designed to support highly promising early career investigators to assure the applicant’s future success as a research scientist in the field of cardiovascular and/or cerebrovascular disease research. Dr. Pi proposes to study the longitudinal proteomic dynamics in right heart failure in patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension.
• Sarah Prager, Complex Family Planning Program Director, is featured in ‘Texas banned abortion — then sepsis rates soared’ from ProPublica.
• Danielle Tran, R3, is lead author and Katherine Wysham, assistant professor (Rheumatology) is senior author of “Improving High-Risk Osteoporosis Medication Adherence and Safety With an Automated Dashboard” in the Federal Register. Department of Medicine co-author is Radhika Narla, Internal Medicine Associate Program Director.
• Claire Quinlan, R1, is lead author of “Comparative Bleeding Risk in Older Patients With HIV and Atrial Fibrillation Receiving Oral Anticoagulants” in JAMA Internal Medicine.
• Coralynn Sack, Occupational and Environmental Medicine Associate Program Director, and Joel Kaufman, professor (General Internal Medicine) are co-authors of “Indoor Air Pollution, CT Airway-to-Lung Ratio and Lung Function Decline: Analyses from SPIROMICS AIR” in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.
• The Department of Surgery Newsletter ‘Surgery Synopsis’ features many voices of the GME community: Check out the Winter 2025 issue.
• Jürgen Unützer, Chair of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, is featured in “WA lawmakers push to expand mental health insurance coverage” from The Seattle Times.

Wellness Corner

The GME Team celebrated Thank a Resident Day across four hospital sites (Harborview, UWML, Seattle Children’s and Seattle VA). This special day was about showing gratitude for the tireless efforts, dedication and invaluable contributions residents make to support patient care and our health care community.

We had:

1. Messages of appreciation: Colleagues, nursing teams, leadership all shared heartfelt messages highlighting the positive impact residents make.
2. Shoutouts: At the event, we gave shoutouts to residents for their teamwork and commitment.
3. Lunches: We treated our residents to a delicious lunch as a token of our appreciation.
4. Swag: we hope the swag was a fun way to bring a smile.

The day reminds us of how vital our residents are to our community. We are grateful to have them as part of our team.