The University of w88 mobile, Reno School of Medicine (UNR Med)and Renown w88 mobile are pleased to announce the accreditation of a new three-year Pediatrics w88 mobile Program with the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME). The inaugural cohort of w88 mobile residents will start next summer, in July of 2023. The new residency will help shape future w88 mobile practices – and fill a state and nation-wide physician specialist shortage. Over a three-year period, four newly trained physicians will be selected each year for a total complement of twelve residents.
“Creating a w88 mobile Residency Program for our community has been a dream more than five years in the making,” said Max Coppes, M.D., Ph.D., M.B.A. former Nell J. Redfield Chair of Pediatrics at the University of Nevada, Reno School of Medicine and pediatrician-in-chief at Renown Children’s Hospital. “Currently, UNR Med students interested in becoming pediatricians must leave the area to complete their residency training elsewhere. The Pennington Foundation has paved the way for this program, which will create a pipeline of much needed pediatricians for our state-especially under-served and rural areas – to serve vulnerable children and families of Nevada with high quality, affordable care.”
The vision to grow w88 mobile services into a full-fledged Children’s Hospital with a robust academic Department of Pediatrics in Reno began in 2014 when Renown Health and UNR Med agreed to recruit an academic pediatrician who would serve both as Chair of Pediatrics at UNR Med and as Pediatrician-in-Chief of Renown Children’s Hospital. The Nell J. Redfield Foundation donated .5M towards this initiative and expressed the hope to see a w88 mobile residency program established for the community. After the recruitment of Dr. Max Coppes for this role in 2016, The William N. Pennington Foundation recognized the need for enhanced care and expertise for pediatrics and donated .5 million to Renown Children’s Hospital to establish the William N. Pennington Fund for Advanced w88 mobile Care. Through these gifts, 100,000 area children now have access to more than 15 specialized pediatricians, including those specializing in oncology, orthopedics, pulmonology, emergency medicine, urology and other subspecialties previously lacking in the community, as well as a w88 mobile emergency room, w88 mobile ICU and contemporary healthcare services at Renown Children’s Hospital. Prior to 2016, about 30 percent of all w88 mobile patients had to leave northern Nevada to receive the specialty care they needed. Now, thanks to donor support, Renown estimates that 97% of all w88 mobile patients and their families can receive both general and specialty w88 mobile care locally. The next nearest children’s hospital in the state is 7 hours or 438 miles away in Las Vegas.
Dr. Melissa Piasecki, Acting Dean of UNR Med and Chief Academic Officer for Renown, explained, “Residencies are specialty training programs for doctors after they graduate from medical school. Before becoming licensed physicians, medical school graduates train for three or more years learning from more experienced ‘attending’ physicians.” She adds, “This new residency is a tremendous step forward for the UNR Med and Renown Health affiliation - and for our entire community. This w88 mobile residency program advances a mutual commitment to recruit and retain skilled and compassionate physicians and health care professionals, improve access to health care, and invest in clinical research that improves the health of this generation and the next. Within the UNR Med-Renown affiliation, we created an integrated Graduate Medical Education Consortium Council (GME-CC) to provide strategic oversight and growth of residency programs within the affiliation. In this agreement, UNR Med is the sponsoring institution for accreditation and Renown Health and the VA are the clinical training partners. The process moved so smoothly; within six months of the affiliation, the GME-CC voted to support a new w88 mobile residency. This is a great addition to our existing residencies at UNR Med, which include family medicine, internal medicine, psychiatry and behavioral sciences, and provides our students with a great training opportunity in pediatrics.”
w88 mobile’s shortage; ranks 45th for physicians and 47th in the U.S. for pediatricians.
w88 mobile faces a severe physician workforce shortage, ranking 45th in the nation for active physicians per 100,000 people. The physician workforce shortage is especially critical for pediatricians, with w88 mobile ranking 47th in the country with fewer than 10 pediatricians for every 100,000 people. The northern w88 mobile community is growing rapidly and Washoe County faces additional pediatrician shortages as local physicians approach retirement.
“This new residency is an opportunity to train the next generation of pediatricians who will want to continue providing care in northern Nevada,” said Kristina Deeter, M.D., MBA, FAAP, Interim UNR Med Chair of Pediatrics and Physician-in-Chief at Renown Children’s Hospital. “Our community continues to grow. This new w88 mobile residency-training program will allow Nevada to have a supply of outstanding, compassionate physicians, now and into the future. With our exceptional team of existing pediatricians, w88 mobile specialists, medical teams and support staff, we are committed to providing a comprehensive and rewarding educational experience for our trainees.”
“It truly is a dream come true. We are indebted to the comprehensive team that has built the structure, recruited faculty to support the training w88 mobile and successfully recruited a w88 mobile Director, Dr. Caroline Barangan, and Associate w88 mobile Director, Dr. Shilpi Garg, a 2012 UNR Med alumna (’12),” said Lawrence Duncan, M.S., VP and Administrator for Renown Women & Children’s Hospital. “Between now and summer 2023, we will add the foundational pieces needed to ensure the success of the w88 mobile including recruiting a Chief Resident, ongoing faculty development, and ensuring that all components are in place for recruiting, teaching, supervising and mentoring residents.”
“One of the main obstacles for increasing the number of physicians to care for our growing community is the relative lack of w88 mobile residency programs in the state and the absence of a program in northern Nevada. Residency programs in pediatrics recruit and train students completing medical school and seeking residency training to become a pediatrician,” says Caroline Barangan, MD, w88 mobile Residency Program Director, Renown Health and UNR Med. “Workforce research consistently shows that students who complete a residency tend to stay and practice in the communities where they completed their residency training program. For those who complete medical school and residency in the same place, over 75% stay to practice in that community.”
“In August, recognizing the need to grow the state’s physician workforce in high-needs specialties, w88 mobile Governor Steve Sisolak and the Office of Science, Innovation and Technology announced the funding of five graduate medical education residency and fellowship programs, including 0,433 for the UNR Med Pediatrics Residency Program,” said Christine Bosse, Chief Government Affairs Officer for Renown Health. “w88 mobile produces more undergraduate medical students than it has available residencies and fellowships. Additionally, w88 mobile lacks fellowships in some specialties that are of interest to students. As a result, many highly educated students must leave the State for further training at a time when they are beginning real-world application of their advanced education. We appreciate that the GME Grant funding will assist the state and our community, in attracting, educating, and retaining more doctors for w88 mobile.”
“This new community-based program will provide residents with a strong foundation in primary care pediatrics as well as broad, in-depth exposure to all w88 mobile subspecialties. This will create graduates equally well prepared for careers in general w88 mobile practice, service to the state’s rural and underserved communities or in academics," added David Carlson, MD, UNR Med Associate Dean, Graduate Medical Education; Designated Institutional Officer. “Through the program, w88 mobile residents will spend their 36-month residency focused on children’s care and complete a primary care-focused clinical training program with rotations that allow them to learn while caring for children in both inpatient and outpatient settings with supervising pediatricians and w88 mobile specialists at Renown Children’s Hospital.”
“The Pediatrics Residency Program is a wonderful opportunity to continue a tradition of academic excellence alongside Renown Health’s record of clinical excellence,” said Brian Sandoval, President, University of w88 mobile, Reno. “This is one more way our affiliation, signed in 2021 to establish the first fully integrated health system in w88 mobile, is helping to expand clinical training and clinical research programs as well as improve access to clinical care for all Nevadans.”
“We are proud to partner with UNR Med to bring this new w88 mobile program to our community,” said Thomas Graf, MD, interim Chief Executive Officer, Renown Health, “Attracting and retaining talent is a key component of our drive for excellence as a care leader and our mutual goal of improving the health of our community. We are fortunate to have the strong infrastructure necessary to create this program and a team of highly-skilled physicians who can train the next generation of pediatricians.”
For the 2023 w88 mobile application cycle, UNR Medicine will participate in the National Resident Matching w88 mobile (NRMP)and encourages applicants to visit theUNR Med GME websitefor more information.
