long time

I had no idea so much time had passed since I last blogged. It seems like only a few days ago that the RIF occurred. It is still painful.

Some good things are happening though. I heard today that alumnus Pompeyo Chavez and his wife had a healthy baby boy today. Also current R2 Sashi Braga and his wife welcomed a healthy baby girl to their family this week. Congratulations to all of them!

Also, faculty member Jim King who was affected in the RIF has been hired by the Baytown FMRP, so he will stay in the area. They are adding a great faculty member to their program. Our loss is their gain. I'm happy that Jim found a good spot in a good program.

Former Dept of FM member Susan Berkley PA who was working for the Dept of Surgery most recently and affected by the RIF has accepted a position at the 4Cs Clinic.

A community hospitalist physician at one of our community hospital partners today agreed to take the R3s onto her hospital service to finish out their last required block so they are on track to finish their curriculum and graduate on schedule. We are still waiting to see if John Sealy reopens on January 5th as projected. If so, we will staff that service with R1s and R2s.

Things are coming along with our new clinic space at UHC. We have been plagued by computer bugs and glitches since opening but it seems that some significant progress was made yesterday in resolving most if not all of the current problems.

Scheduling has been a major problem since the RIF, because key administrative staff were lost who normally managed that function. This week saw major strides toward figuring out a new process for dealing with scheduling and we are all hopeful that it will be simpler and easier to manage from January forward.

Recruiting is going very well, much better in fact than I ever dreamed it would this year. We appreciate the support shown by our applicants and are grateful that we've been able to progress with this more or less as normal.

I think we are all very much looking forward to the holiday break. I'm hopeful that the new year will bring good things for Galveston Island and UTMB.