ACP CONFERENCE

Congratulations to all our residents who participated in our regional Vermont/New Hampshire ACP meeting at Trapps Family Lodge in Stowe!

Scott Johnson, Anish Amin, and Dan Collins won the Vermont Clinical Vignette competition with their poster "Non-traumatic rib fracture: An unusual presentation of extranodal marginal zone lymphoma."

Sukit Ringwala took first place in the Vermont Research competition with his poster "Platelet suppression with rivaroxaban in patients with coronary artery disease."

For the first time in VT/NH regional ACP history, our residents competed against Dartmouth's in the Doctor's Dilemma (ACP's Jeopardy equivalent). Will Cobell, Scott Johnson, Nick Lim, and Sarah Mooney threw down some serious knowledge, going into Final Jeopardy in a near dead-heat with Dartmouth. With our correct final answer, our team won the competition and now has the opportunity to compete at the annual ACP Doctor's Dilemma, which will be this spring in Toronto.

All in all, a great day in Stowe. Special thanks to our residents who covered services for our conference attendees.

ACP Conference

Our Fletcher Allen residents recently competed in clinical vignette and research posters, as well as in Jeopardy at the regional ACP meeting. Full results to follow!

Congratulations

Memo
To: Faculty and Residents in the Department of Medicine

From: Mark A. Levine, M.D.
Associate Chairman for Education and
Residency Program Director
Department of Medicine


I am delighted to announce that the following second year residents have been selected to the position of Chief Medical Resident for the 2010-2011 academic year:

Zechariah Gardner
Mia Hockett

Both of these outstanding residents completed their medical training here at the University of Vermont. Please join me in offering congratulations and best wishes to them.

Friday Round Up

Grand Rounds: Hospital Epidemiologist W. Kemper Alston MD, MPH discussed Infection control/prevention strategies. It was a very dynamic talk that included FAHC/UVM infection data and National data. Bottom line: Continue to wash your hands

Morning Report: Chief Complaint: Nausea. Dr. Jaquith presented a complicated case which turned out to be Hep A

Intern Report: Chief Complaint: RLQ pain. Acting Intern J. Pare presented a great case of a renal infarct secondary to endocarditis affecting a bovine mitral valve

ECG shows signs of LA enlargment and Right Axis Deviation - Dr. Antkowiak called it correctly

ROMA-Resident of the Month Award

Resident of the Month: For ownership and going above and beyond expectations

Fred Rydz, MD, FROMA:

–He went home post call, kept his pager on, and when a family member called him to discuss code status and goals of care for their elderly relative he talked with them and then CAME BACK IN to talk with the patient again and tidy up loose ends.
–He then came to Board review

Award given: Organic Cafeteria Vouchers for hormone free edibles worth 20 USD. AKA stimulus package.

note: FROMAGE = Fellow of the Resident of the Month Award

Congrats Fred.

Dont forget to nominate residents for next month

MH

NEJM

UVM Medicine is not all about green mountains and maple syrup. The April 9th 2009 New England Journal of Medicine printed an original article titled, "Efficacy of Esomeprazole for Treatment of Poorly Controlled Asthma". This research and article was by The American Lung Association Asthma Clinical Research Centers. UVM's Northern New England Consortium (previously known as Vermont Lung Center at the Universith of Vermont) is proud to be one of the Clinical Research Centers.

Our very own attendings - Drs. Charlie Irvin, Anne Dixon and David Kaminsky - are the co principal investigaters for UVM.  They are one of many academicians amongst our green mountains.  If you have any questions after reading the article, I'm sure they would love to answer them. Just give them a call or talk to them when you see them walking the floors.

Green team is money

Green team:
Led by Drs Rose Christian and Ellie Mueller; Powered by Sukeet Ringwala and Fred Rydz....

Et al surged in the late round of medical jeopardy to win the battle of the wards teams.

After wiping the sweat from his brow, Fred stated, " it was touch and go for a moment with the buzzer having a mind of its own ....luckily Ringwala stepped it up and we were able to take the win". Fans noted that the team won by knowing the answers to actual medical questions, a rare occurance.
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Match Day

Paula Borah (pictured above) danced a jig and welcomed in our new interns. It was close enough to Paddy's Day, where she downed some water of life and read out the list. Unfortunately, she called every male Joseph and every female Mary. Either way, here is the real list:

Welcome incoming interns:

Anish Amin, U of Dundee, United Kingdom. home of Sir James Black (Nobel prize in Medicine), seated in the "City of Discovery"
Anne Bantle, U of Minnesota , home of the Golden Gophers
Jason Brazelton, U of South Alabama, home of the Jaguars
Dan Collins, U of Utah, home of the Utes
Scott Davis, U of Vermont, home of the Catamounts
Alison Fitzgerald, U of Vermont, home of the Catamounts
Emily Glick, U of Vermont, home of the Catamounts
Carl Henderson, UMDNJ, home of ?? - perhaps strip malls or the Camden Riversharks (you'll have to clarify this when you get here Carl)
Laura McGevna, U of Vermont, home of the Catamounts
Brian Monroe, U of Illinois, not home of Chief Illiniwek
Elizabeth Nimmich, U of South Carolina, home of the Gamecocks
Mitchell Nimmich, U of South Carolina, who's motto is "Learning humanizes"
Glencora Pontee, Ben Gurion U, home of...David Ben Gurion (Israel's 1st prime minister)
William Prabhu, SUNY Upstate, home of the motto "Let knowledge grow from more to more; and so be human life enriched"
Mathew Prall, U of Utah, home of the Utes
Nathan Rosenberg, U of Vermont, home of the Catamounts
Jadwiga Stanek, Jagiellonski U, home of Copernicus
Kirk Wangensteen, U of Minnesota, home of the Golden Gopher

Some remain Catamounts, others become Catamounts, "What's Missing?"

Now we're "all one" (shameless references to Fletcher Allen's newest advertising campaigns)

Paula can't wait to meet you.

From the Archives

I found this nugget of history in a useless folder, buried deep in the electronic bowels of the Chief folder. It dates back to when Erik Rufa was chief (now Hospitalist Attending) and when Nate Madsen was a resident. (now Cardiology Fellow). Thousands of years from now, I wonder how historians will analyze this? I suppose it depends on if ties were still in fashion...or if the Star Trek unitards will be dominating 5th Ave....Youngstown OH (In the future, NYC will have reached its prime, and the city that never sleeps will be Youngstown)

Maybe alien life forms are scouring for other life and will intercept this video. How will they interpret this film? Will there fake gesture of friendliness be tyring to have a "tie race"? Only time will tell...or we'll forget about it and feel bad that we didn't delete it....

Yes It Happened

As with much of the world, UVM/FAHC celebrated the inauguration of our 44th President and Vice-President: Barack H. Obama and Joe R. Biden. The mood at the hospital and our residency was excitement. Political affiliations, Red Sox, Yankees...all were put aside...


The hospital televised the inauguration in Davis (The "big" Auditorium near the med school). Not only did staff clamor to Davis, our residents went to enormous efforts to transport patients to experience the celebratory vibe as well. Needless to say, all televisions were on at 1205. The theme of the inauguration was, "A New Birth of Freedom," commemorating the 200th anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln. Placing his hand on the Bible once used by Lincoln, Barack Obama took the Oath of Office at 12:05 p.m. on the steps of the U.S. Capitol.

As most readers know, 75% of eligible Vermonters showed up to vote with 66% of them voting for Obama/Biden. Needless to say the enthusiasm for our new president is high, especially with our very own Gastroenterologist Peter L. Moses MD, Professor of Medicine UVM COM and Associate Vice President for Network Development FAHC. Ever since the election, Dr. Moses literally has been hanging out with now President Obama (see below).
"Barack, has always got my back...." states Dr. Moses, "mostly because I put him in the corner next to my chair". We briefly discussed politics with Dr. Moses:

IMVermont: What political party do you affiliate yourself with?

MosesMD: I respect all people, no matter what side of the ligament of Treitz they stand on...

IMVermont: Ok....what did you think of....


MosesMD: (click here for background music)

Oh, say can you see by the scope’s zenon light?
What so proudly I sail at my amazing cancer screening;
Whose broad polyps and AVMs, through the perilous scope,
O’er the monitors we watched were so briskly bleeding?
And the mucosa’s red glare, polyps excised with no care,
Gives proof to the scope light, that intact colon wall was still there:
O….Say does that pedunculated polyp yet wave (not)
O’er the land of the cancer free and the home of the saved?

God bless Barack Obama and God bless the
United States of America.

IMVermont: Dr. Moses…that was amazing…Barack is still smiling....

Please note that Dr. Moses probably did not use the words above to express his happiness and patriotism...But trust that he was one of many that celebrated in the peaceful transition of power and a new birth of freedom....

Remember the Holidays?

As the holiday season is over, we all are "fa la, laing " back into our middle management jobs, interviews, research, fuller pants, emptier pockets, vitamin D deficiency and [oh yeah] patient care. How does one cope with the post holiday blues? I tried to consult Psych for answers, but had to wait 14 months for an appointment.


Some options that I came up with are: 1) an SSRI 2) full spectrum light bulbs 3) extreme caffienation 4) Skiing till you get rhabdo 4) Daydreaming and live in wonderful memories of the past.


(click here for Jethro Tull's background music for this blog).


I will briefly be concentrating on #4. Tuning out is not an uncommon phenomena in hard working residents. It's like sleeping with your eyes open. A resident can tune out at any moment: during morning report, rounds, noon conference, patient interivews, and even while reading this.... They may tune out to streaming colors, mock wrestling matches between celebrities and comic book characters, or talking animals doing human jobs with surgically enhanced puppets as their assitants.


What memories of the past would residents have to reside in to break away from the dredges of hospital life? Memories of the holidays are be a viable option. If you have the post holidays blues, the high must of been holiday related. A few examples of the memories this program has 1) the holiday party 2) being somewhere else and not working 3) new additions to our family


1) Our holiday party: thrown at Three Tomatoes, on Church street was an evening with appetizers, drinks, and music. Of note, more interns came out versus the previous holiday parties (the one applicant reading this will find this fact comforting). The night progressed late into the night at 1/2 lounge. When asked about this the next day, intern Mary Ellen Antkowiak described the party as, "memorable" in between bites of intern report provided greasy pasta,mountain dew. and cookies (cookies alone could be something to daydream about...)


2)Places we've been: This entry is specifically for Natalie Sinclair. Remember when you were in Australia? I'm not sure if Natalie will be daydreaming of what's below as she Night ICU's it up. Note that Natalie does not sponsor Coke Zero....




3) New additions: Our residents are greatful for adding to the family. Over the holidays, there were new births:

R1 Scott Loomis and wife Artegmis welcomed baby Anitgone Loomis (above)

R1 Will Cobell and family welcomed baby Boston "the Boss" Jay Cobell (above)

R2 Zech Gardner and Jaina Clough (former resident, now fabulous primary care physician) welcomed Cal Gardner (above)

So...plenty of reasons to break us out of the post holiday doldrums. Warm thoughts of social occations, family, travel all wrapped up while we work. These are just some examples of what we weave into our minds as we help others cope with their own blues....

Silly Husky...doesnt he know he cant suture? And why do Burt & Ernie keep falling down? They look more top heavy than I remember....Sorry tuned out. Go ski.