| January
2000 TSDANews
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Letter
from the President Update on TSRA Standing Committee Reports Results of 2000 NRMP Match Program Clearinghouse Activities 1999/2000 Faculty & Fellowship Positions |
| Letter from President Gordon Olinger, MD The year 2000 has all sorts of implications, not the least of which is the potential for the hugest hangover in collective memory. Hopefully, the hangovers will have worn off by the time we meet in Ft. Lauderdale on Saturday before the Society of Thoracic Surgeons meeting. We have a lot to do! The prospect for change in education of thoracic surgery residents during the next decade is assured in two regards. First, the manner in which we evaluate resident education will necessarily include assessment of outcomes along the line of competencies. Dr. David Leach, Executive Director of the ACGME, will address the Directors on this subject as a feature speaker on Saturday. The broad concept of competence will be the subject of Dr. David Nahrwold's address that same day. Dr. Nahrwold is the chairman of the Task Force on Competence of the American Board of Medical Specialties. As your president, I will be forming an ad hoc task force among our Directors to prepare us to deal with these issues as they impact on the education and evaluation of our thoracic surgery residents. Second, the American Board of Thoracic Surgery at its fall meeting continued deliberation relative to the possibility of making certification by the American Board of Surgery optional for certification in Thoracic Surgery. Dr. Fred Crawford, the current chairman of the American Board of Thoracic Surgery, will address the Directors during the business session on Saturday to explain the Board's position. A freestanding meeting of the TSDA is being planned for September 2000 to deliberate aggressively about this opportunity. In 2001, plans are being made for a joint meeting in the spring with the Association of Program Directors in Surgery, a further step in the evolution of what I believe to be inevitable changes in our educational format. I hope all of you will attend the meeting in Ft. Lauderdale. Please bring your Associate Directors if they can come. I can't predict where we'll be at the end of the third millennium, but I can say with confidence that this will be a very dynamic beginning to the first decade of the third millennium. It will be a challenge to all of us. |
January 2000 TSDA Meeting Schedule Fort Lauderdale, Florida TSDA Meeting Curriculum Implementation
Committee Executive Committee TSRA Meeting Prerequisite Committee
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The Thoracic Surgery Speciality Match for 2001 has begun with an announcement from the National Resident Matching Program. The Universal Resident Application which was designed and approved by the TSDA in 1996 to simplify the application process for residents will continue to be used. Application forms are available from the NRMP office and are mailed to applicants when they register. October, 1999 February 9, 2000
March 8, 2000 April 7, 2000 June 7, 2000
June 28, 2000
June 28 - July
28, 2000 Each year the TSDA selects one outstanding research presentation sponsored by a thoracic surgery training program in the United States or Canada at the Society of Thoracic Surgery meeting. The best paper is selected by members of the TSDA Executive Committee. This award is generously supported by a grant from Medtronic, Inc. This year's winner is Evelio Rodriguez, MD, for his paper, entitled, "Smooth Muscle Cell Apoptosis Early After Saphenous Vein Grafting." Dr. Rodriguez is a resident at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital and Dr. Richard N. Edie is his Program Director. Thank you to the following doctors as they have recently been appointed as representatives of the TSDA to the Council of Academic Specialties: Richard Shemin, M.D. and to Antonio Laudito, M.D. and Jorge Salazar, M.D. as resident representatives. Also D. Glenn Pennington, M.D. has been appointed as the TSDA Representative to the Council of Medical Specialty Societies. Universal Application for the Boards The deadline for applications remains August 1. This year, if the application is not received by August 1, the resident will not be permitted to take the exam. TSDA Chicago 2000 A TSDA stand alone program has been established for September 16 - 17, 2000. The meeting will take place at the Hyatt Regency O'Hare. The main focus of this meeting will address the ramifications of an ABTS decision on the prerequisite general surgery boards might have on curriculum and other aspects of thoracic fellowships. Survey Forms A handful of programs have not returned their updated Database Survey Form. If your form is still outstanding, please update and return it to the TSDA Headquarters Office immediately. Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact the office at (703) 820-7400. |
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The Thoracic Surgery Residents Association (TSRA), a national organization consisting of all thoracic surgery residents is well underway. The purpose of the TSRA is to provide a forum for exchange of ideas and information among the residents and to improve communication between the residents (the students) and the Program Directors (the teachers.) The Association has met on the Tuesday evenings in conjunction with the ACS, AATS and STS over the last year. The next meeting of the TSRA has been scheduled for Tuesday, February 1, at the Greater Fort Lauderdale/Broward County Convention in conjunction with our TSDA meeting at the STS. Please encourage any of your residents who will be attending the STS meeting to attend the TSRA meeting as well. For further information please contact the newly elected officers: Antonio Laudito, M.D., President at alaudito@surgery.ucsf.edu; (415) 614-0751 or Jorge Salazar, M.D., Secretary at jsalazar@welchlink.jhu.edu. Curriculum Implementation Committee Industry sponsored funding has allowed the TSDA to greatly enhance and expand its curriculum effort. The CIC has put an immense amount of time into the creation of an on-line, interactive curriculum. The committee has selected the following members to spearhead this project: William A. Baumgartner, MD and David Campbell, MD who receive much support from the following Section Editors: John H. Calhoon, MD - Congenital; Douglas J. Mathisen, MD - General; Richard J. Shemin, MD - Cardiac. As much of the content will be related or very similar to that of the Prerequisite Curriculum, the two committees are working closely to avoid any duplicative efforts. The Curriculum Implementation Committee has established an approximate release date of October, 2000 for this component of the curriculum. The Prerequisite Curriculum Committee Under the leadership of Dr. Jeffery Gold, the Prerequisite Curriculum Committee has made great strides in compiling and creating the Prerequisite Curriculum CD-Rom. The following individuals have been appointed as Section Editors for the CD Rom Curriculum: Verdi DiSesa, M.D., Eugene Grossi, M.D., Thomas Spray, M.D., Richard Whyte, M.D., David Wood, M.D. and Joe Zwischenberger, M.D. The committee has also completed the process of assigning authors to generate the various sub-sections of the curriculum. With the assistance of the recently filled web-editor position, Ms. Alethea Wieland, the instructions for the prerequisite contributing authors can now be found on the TSDA Webpage and the multimedia compilation of the already submitted individual sections has begun. Upon analysis of the prerequisite evaluations from the incoming residents and the collection of remaining sections from both the authors and section editors, a projected time frame for the release of the finish product has been set for July, 2000. The Requisite Curriculum Committee The Requisite Curriculum Committee has reviewed the 1994 Curriculum publication. Text changes have been submitted and a new submission addressing geriatrics is being considered. Results of the Questionnaire from 2000 Appointments of the NRMP Match Program We have compiled the edited comments made by residents who were sampled concerning the recent match. Of those 65 that responded, 58 (89%) felt that the Match was effective in achieving its goals; 5 (8%) felt that they had experienced undue pressure to commit outside of the Match; 30 (46%) would be interested in some sort of standard time or regionalization of the interview process; 30 (46%) did not prefer some sort of standard time or regionalization of the interview process. The number of Programs at which residents interviewed ranged from 1 to 20 (avg = 10). The total cost of these interviews to the applicants ranged from $0 to $10,000 (avg = $4,386). As results indicated most programs actively participated within the rules and spirit of the match. Clearly there are a few programs which did not honor that spirit. You know who you are! The Executive Committee as well as the Ad Hoc Committee on Resident Match will continue to investigate ways to simplify this process for the residents as well as to make it more fair. We have elected to continue to use the National Resident Match Program for 2001. The TSDA has acted as a clearinghouse for thoracic surgery faculty positions and for fellowship positions within the United States. It has also attempted to match late or previously unmatched thoracic surgery applicants with unexpected openings in residency programs. There are presently 16 residency programs in the United States seeking a general thoracic surgery faculty member and 11 have indicated a need for more general thoracic faculty beginning in July, 2000. A list of these programs is available from the TSDA Headquarter office. We believe tracking this information is important not only because it helps residents locate faculty positions but it is also helpful in determine trends in academic faculty manpower needs and the desirability of investing in resident research time. TSDA Database Survey Results of Available Faculty & Fellowship positions - 1999/2000 Summary General Thoracic Surgery Faculty Positions
Cardiac Surgery Faculty Positions
Research Faculty
Clinical Fellowships Available - 1999
Research Fellowships
Available - 1998
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| TSDANews is a quarterly publication of the Thoracic Surgery Directors Association, 4900B South 31st Street, Arlington, VA 22206, (703) 820-7400. |
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TSDA Officers |