Pep Talk — September 2017

Can you believe another academic year has already started and in just about 120 days, 2017 will give way to 2018? Lots to catch you up on.  First – congratulations again to those faculty who were promoted in rank effective July 1, 2017.  Dr. Kamal Pourmoghadam at Orlando Health, Associate Professor, was promoted to Professor; eight others were promoted to Associate Professor:  Florida Hospital:  Drs. Sebastian De la Fuente and Ahmed Zakari; Nemours Children’s Hospital:  Dr. John Lovejoy;  Ocala:  Drs. Rakesh Prashad and Ettore Crimi;  Orlando Health – AP:  Dr. Gene Chen and  VAMC – Orlando:  Drs. Pran Kar and  Fabian Rossi.  Thirteen faculty submitted requests to be considered this fall for advancement January 1.  Remember, the promotion process for affiliated and volunteer faculty occurs semi-annually.  Twice a year – by June 30 or December 31 – the dean of the UCF College of Medicine accepts nominations of faculty members whose accomplishments warrant consideration for promotion. The next deadline is December 31 for promotion on July 1, 2018.   Please contact the college’s Faculty Life Office if you need assistance with preparing your dossier – which includes a CV, personal statement and three letters of recommendation.

The Class of 2021, our ninth class to matriculate and fifth at full enrollment  of 120 began August 7 with the traditional White Coat Ceremony.  The students were selected from 4,823 applicants and 87 are Florida residents.  Over 90 percent did scientific research before coming to medical school in areas including epilepsy, tuberculosis, autism, breast and brain cancer and Alzheimer’s disease.  Nineteen have masters or doctoral degrees and four are military veterans.  I hope you have an opportunity to mentor and teach these outstanding women and men.  Last May, 113 UCF medical students – poets, engineers, painters and microbiologists — received their M.D. degree at the college’s fifth graduation. The Class of 2017 was the college’s first class at full enrollment and 100 percent matched into residencies – compared to the national average of 94.3 percent. Can you believe that the college has now graduated 376 physician Knights who are either in residency/fellowship programs or  are already in practice and being the “Good Doctor”?

As of July, UCF has 255 resident physicians in 15 GME programs through a consortium between the med school and Hospital Corporation of America. These residents are caring for patients at Regional Medical Centers in Osceola, Ocala and North Florida in Gainesville in Internal, Emergency and Family Medicine,  General Surgery, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Neurology and Psychiatry.  The UCF-HCA consortium is expected to bring 600-plus new residency slots to Florida by 2020.  Our landscape at Lake Nona is going to change shortly with the construction of a hospital in partnership with HCA – the UCF Lake Nona Medical Center.  Its foundation will be poured by January 2019, and the completion is targeted for late 2020 or early 2021.  It was only 10  years ago that Medical City was grazing land for cattle and horses and look at the transformation that has occurred already.

We are in the home stretch for the M.D. program’s accreditation from the LCME and the CPD’s accreditation from the ACCME. At the end of last month, the Independent Student Analysis (ISA), Data Collection Instrument (DCI), Self-Study Report (SSR) and the AAMC Graduation Questionnaire from the Class of 2017 were submitted to the LCME.  Five distinguished physicians from Drexel, Commonwealth, Temple, Mississippi and AAMC have been appointed as our site team and will visit the college Oct. 22-25 to meet with faculty, staff and students. Their report will go to the LCME in December and we should hear about our accreditation after the LCME Committee meets in February.

At the end of June, the college submitted its self-study report to the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) for our CPD Program to be fully accredited.  That visit will occur on October 18, with notification in February 2018.

In June, UCF was selected as the recipient of the first Public Health Excellence in Interprofessional Education Collaboration Award that honors interdisciplinary healthcare teams that significantly impact the community they serve. Students and faculty from UCF’s medicine, nursing, physical therapy and social work programs and UF’s pharmacy school have worked together to provide free care to patients in a makeshift clinic at the Farmworker Association of Florida office in Apopka.  National officials said they selected UCF’s program because it exemplified excellence in teamwork to serve a medically underserved community.  Dr. Judy Simms-Cendan, director of international experiences, and professor of obstetrics and gynecology, organized the clinics.  This summer she also led an interdisciplinary healthcare team, organized by the student-run global health organization, MedPACt, to Yantaló, an underserved district in Peru, 600 miles from Lima.  Over 350 people received medical care addressing minor complaints to some requiring surgery.

The Osceola Equestrian Therapy Center, a partnership with the college, Osceola County and the McCormick Research Institute, was named a premier accredited center for equine-therapy recently. Its state-of-the-art facilities at Chisholm Park provides therapy to veterans and others year-round.  Dr. Manette Monroe, a lifelong horsewoman and associate professor of pathology in the college, leads the research efforts in  therapeutic benefits for physically and mentally disabled veterans and others, including autistic children and patients suffering from Parkinson’s disease.

Well – by the length of this Pep Talk, you can see your college has been very busy these past few months .  I want to thank each of you for your continued support of the educational program.  Our success is only because of your expertise and involvement and such is very much appreciated.

Go Knights!  Charge On!