From the Chairman

It has been a busy fall.

Interview season is upon us.  With eight four years residency positions to fill, there have been over eight hundred applicants!  We have offered interviews to approximately eighty candidates, and will finish our interviews in January.  We have also interviewed about twenty candidates for our two post graduate year (PGY) two positions. The departmental rank list will be sent in February and we will have the results in mid-March—so stay tuned!

In November, the department underwent its five year review.  Drs. Michael Wall, the chair of Anesthesiology at the University of Minnesota, and Timothy E. Morey, the chair of Anesthesiology at the University of Florida Gainesville, conducted a two day on campus assessment having scrutinized the one hundred twenty page departmental self-study.  They spoke with members of the department and leaders throughout the medical center.  The review was complete in late November.  From the report and subsequent meetings a strategic plan to lead the department for the next five years will be developed this spring.

Our core residency program and pain medicine fellowship were also reviewed in November.  For both this was the scheduled ten year review.  When the Residency Review Committee meets this spring, the results should be made known to us.  The pediatric anesthesiology fellowship received full accreditation this fall as well as matching with two outstanding fellows.  Our pain program matched with four superior candidates and added an exceptional fifth fellow in November. Our cardiothoracic anesthesiology fellowship filled for July 2020.  Educationally the department is stronger than it has ever been.

Clinically, the department has been busier than ever.  We have seen a small but incremental growth in our operating room volumes both in number of cases and in operating room minutes.  There has been tremendous growth, however in our non-operating room anesthetizing locations—approximately twenty-one percent overall growth in 2019.  We have opened a new pain clinic site at the Belhaven building and another in the medical office building on the campus of the Merit Madison Hospital.

Looking forward, 2020 will be a year of change for the department.  With the results of the program, pain fellowship and departmental review, no doubt there will be changes making the department better able to respond to the challenges of healthcare in the twenty-first century.  Yet our team is ready to meet the test!  The New Year will be our best yet.

Welcome to our new attendings: Oscar Alam-Mendez, Patricia Amolenda, Matt Buck, Laura Cavallone, Chris Dos Santos, Forrest Duncan, Patrick Newman, Jeremy Rainey, and Caroline Walker.  Also please welcome our new CRNAS:  Mary Heard, Joseph Sudderth, Alex Bradley, Kristen Cox, Madison Nowell, Abby Peppers, Emma To, Myisha Dixon, Megan Bass, Ransom Jones, Gary Chandler, Mary Johnson, and welcome back to Mandy Cribbs!!