Family medicine, considered the oldest and broadest subspecialty of medicine, plays a critical role in maintaining community health and access to care. In fact, 90 percent of primary care doctors are family physicians, providing care of a wide range of ailments and conditions from newborns to seniors.

Eric Coris, MD

Eric Coris, MD, professor and chair of the Department of Family Medicine in the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine, said that family physicians significantly enhance overall health outcomes, particularly for patients from underserved populations.

Aspiring doctors echo this sentiment. Kirtan Patel, a fourth year Morsani College of Medicine student, emphasizes his commitment to the community: “Free clinic work is crucial. It provides a place for the underinsured and uninsured in the community to receive medical care.”

However, the United States – and especially a state like Florida — faces a severe shortage of primary care doctors, posing a serious healthcare challenge. The Association of American Medical Colleges estimates that the country will need an additional 55,000 primary care physicians over the next 10 years to keep up with demand.

To counteract this shortage, USF Health and Tampa General Hospital are joining forces to offer a Family Medicine residency position starting in July 2025. Dr. Coris underlined the necessity of these residency programs, saying, “These programs play a pivotal role in strengthening the health care infrastructure, nurturing a new generation of physicians and facilitating enhanced patient care.”

Patel added, “Family Medicine is the specialty geared toward primary care and preventative care.”

Kirtan Patel studies recently at the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine in downtown Tampa.

Family medicine training includes care for pediatric patients, adults, and pregnant women. The field often attracts medical students and residents passionate about serving their communities, which is key in addressing healthcare disparities and enhancing community health.

“Making a difference in the community is a powerful feeling,” Patel said. “The more family medicine physicians we can train and graduate, the better for any community as a whole.”

The goal remains clear: cultivate family medicine physicians through effective residency programs, enhancing access to care and reducing healthcare disparities.

The family medicine residency program will be a key addition to the nation’s fastest-rising medical school in primary care over the past decade, as recognized by U.S. News & World Report Academic Insights.

The USF Health Morsani College of Medicine Academy of Distinguished Educators class of 2022 (Left to right): Eduardo Gonzalez, MD, FAAFP; Andreas Seyfang, PhD; John Armstrong, MD, FACS; Marzenna Wiranowska, PhD, MS; Susan Pross, PhD.

The USF Health Morsani College of Medicine (MCOM) recently celebrated the newest members of the Academy of Distinguished Educators during a small induction ceremony Sept. 20.

Class of 2022 Inductees:

• John Armstrong, MD
• Eduardo Gonzalez, MD, FAAFP
• Susan Pross, PhD
• Andreas Seyfang, PhD
• Marzenna Wiranowska, PhD, MS

“To us falls the high privilege and great responsibility of training the generation of doctors.  If we fail to do our job to perfection, people die needlessly.  Too often this simple truth is forgotten, but each of you never forget.” said Charles J. Lockwood, MD, MHCM, USF Health executive vice president and MCOM dean. All of you are a testament to why MCOM continues to thrive and why our reputation across the nation continues to rise.”

The program was developed as a collaborative effort by MCOM’s Department of Medical Education, Faculty Council, and Office of Faculty Affairs to enhance the practice, quality and scholarship of teaching and learning at the medical school through educational service, consultation and research.   The program honors exemplary educators of all medical students, physicians, physician assistants, physical therapists, athletic trainers and scientists within the faculty by awarding the prestigious title of Distinguished Educator.

Nominees must hold an active appointment at MCOM for at least two years and hold the minimum title of associate professor.  Nominees must have made exceptional contributions to the education mission in one or more of the following ways:

• Research in education.
• Innovations and scholarly approaches in curriculum development, instructional design, or assessment of student learning.
• Mentoring and development of faculty as educators or educational researchers.
• Individual learner mentoring and development.
• Leadership in education.

About the Inductees:

John Armstrong, MD, FACS.

John Armstrong, MD, FACS  is a nationally recognized surgeon and USF Health professor who has held multiple positions within USF Health and the Florida government.  He served as chief medical officer of the Center for Advanced Medical Learning and Simulation (CAMLS), surgical director of the USF Health American Colleges of Surgeons Accredited Education Institute and professor in the MCOM Department of Surgery.  He also served as Surgeon General and Secretary of Health under former Governor Rick Scott from 2012 to 2016.

Eduardo Gonzalez, MD, FAAFP.

Eduardo Gonzalez MD, FAAFP, joined USF Health in 1994.  He  serves as a professor and director in the MCOM Department of Family Medicine, professor in the Taneja College of Pharmacy Department of Pharmacy Practice.  He is co-medical director of the USF Health BRIDGE Clinic, a free student-run clinic that serves uninsured adults from underserved communities.  In 2019, Dr. Gonzalez was named Physician of the Year by the American Academy of Family Physicians.  He is also a two-time USF alum having completed his undergraduate degree in 1987, and medical school in 1991.

Susan Pross, PhD.

Susan Pross, PhD has been part of the Morsani College of Medicine since 1975.  She is a professor in the MCOM Department of Molecular Medicine and director of the MCOM Office of Research Innovation and Scholar Endeavors Scholarly Concentrations Program, where she helps to develop and assess elective opportunities for student scholarship.   She is a trained immunologist and microbiologist  with research interests in allergy, immunology, and infectious disease.

Andreas Seyfang, PhD.

Andreas Seyfang, PhD is an expert in medical microbiology and parasitology.  He holds several professor positions throughout the USF Health colleges to include the Morsani College of Medicine, College of Public Health and School of Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation Sciences.  He’s earned multiple outstanding instructor and teaching awards that are voted on by students.  He is the director of the Seyfang laboratory that focuses on membrane permeases as target for drug delivery, and cytochrome b5 reductase as enzymatic drug target in opportunistic microbial pathogens including protozoan parasites and nosocomial and neuro-pathogenic fungi.

Marzenna Wiranowska, PhD, MS.

Marzenna Wiranowska, PhD, MS is an international expert in microbiology and immunology.  She joined the USF Health staff in 1982 where she started as a research associate in the Immunopharmacology Program at MCOM and currently serves as an associate professor in the Department of Pathology and Cell Biology.  She leads the Medical Humanities elective of the Scholarly Concentrations Program.  Dr. Wiranowska has earned many awards as an educator of medical students including the Most Outstanding Pre-Clinical Professor Award voted on by the MCOM class of 2019.

Story by Freddie Coleman.  Photos by Ryan Rossy

USF Health medical student Tampa Hutchens discusses how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected medical education and what students and USF faculty have done to keep their medical training on track. This is the final episode in an eight-part series looking at the way COVID -19 is impacting the way we live, work and access health care.

In the latest USF Health Brief, Dr. Deborah DeWaay, USF Health associate dean of undergraduate medical education, discusses the current and long-term changes in medical education due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This is the third in an eight-part series looking at the way COVID -19 is impacting the way we live, work and access health care.

Deborah DeWaay, MD, FACP, has been named associate dean of Undergraduate Medical Education in the Office of Educational Affairs of the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine (MCOM).

When she begins in late March, Dr. DeWaay will oversee all components for educating MCOM medical students.  Undergraduate medical education is the overall learning experience students have while in medical school that includes the curriculum, clinical rotations, simulation exercises, and peer projects which add to the complete knowledge and skill set students will have at graduation as they transition to be physicians in training during residency.

Dr. Deborah DeWaay. Photo by Tim Roylance.

“Dr. DeWaay brings to USF Health a broad experience for developing medical curricula and her own passion for teaching will greatly impact our students,” Dr. Bognar said. “Her sense for implementing key components that better meet national trends and standards will help us strengthen our program tremendously.”

Prior to joining USF Health, Dr. DeWaay was associate professor of internal medicine, associate vice-chair for Medical Education, and director of the Internal Medicine Clerkship at the Medical University of South Carolina. She earned her medical degree with a distinction in research from the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine and has won numerous awards for teaching and humanism in medicine.  She is a general internist who practices as a hospitalist.

The Morsani College of Medicine is doing a fantastic job teaching future doctors, Dr. DeWaay said. In her new role, she will help guide the evolution of the medical school curriculum to prepare USF medical students for the ever-changing and rapidly evolving health care system.

“Ideally the educational system focuses on creating physicians who meet the health care system’s needs, and the health care system provides educational opportunities that promote the creation of the physicians it will need,” she said.

Central to the concept, she said, is competency.

“One of my visions is to better incorporate the AAMC’s Entrustable Professional Activities into the curriculum,” she said. “These EPAs are the 13 key skills that, upon graduation, every medical student should be able to demonstrate proficiently before starting residency. Many, if not all, of these 13 activities are likely in the MCOM curriculum already. The next step will be to make student assessment of these competencies even more explicit and to create a system that allows students and educators to glean organized data that will promote continuous improvement of the students and the curriculum.”

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In addition to being able to track competencies, Dr. DeWaay would like to build a system that will let students progress based on those competencies, in order to give added motivation beyond just meeting the competency.

“We have all of these talented students who are anxiously eager to become physicians,” she said. “I want to see our students have their talents cultivated even further prior to residency, so that when they begin their internship the learning curve is alleviated a bit.”

For example, she said, with regard to managing a stroke, if a student has demonstrated competency through simulation exercises, when they rotate with the stroke team, the attendings and residents on that team will know by that student’s presence in that select position that he or she has been trained and proven their ability. Thus, the student can have more responsibility on that team and have an improved experience.

“By increasing the opportunities students have to earn responsibility, we will build their confidence and increase their motivation to push beyond their own perceived limitations” she said.  “In addition, the health system would then provide increased opportunities for students to practice their skill. The result is learners who exceed expectations that allow medical schools to supply even more superior physicians into the health system in order to ultimately provide improved care to our community.”

Another key approach, she said, will be to build stronger clinical decision makers, which means students will have a better, more complete knowledge of the human body. Translated, that means continuing USF’s integration of the basic science and clinical science concepts across all four years. Dr. DeWaay offered this example.

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“In heart failure, for example,” she said, “we administer furosemide, but why? We know all the parameters around dosages, but what else? What is furosemide actually doing? How is our patient’s body actually responding to it? Having a greater foundation in basic science concepts while students are actually in the clinical setting, referencing them directly back to the patient in front of them, will help them be better doctors. It’s called mechanistic thinking, and incorporating it across all four years of medical school will create better clinical decision makers.”

In offering these ideas for what educational approaches make good doctors, Dr. DeWaay is quick to say that it’s a team of educators that helps build the framework.

“It’s important that there’s a unified vision for our goals and that all ideas are considered because there are always different ways to get to our destination,” she said. “The best innovations and solutions to a problem rarely come from one person.  Ideally, the culture cultivates an environment where individuals have novel ideas and the group takes the idea and makes it personalized and successful to the organization at large.”

Once settled in at MCOM, don’t be surprised to see Dr. DeWaay attending classes and clinical rotations as she gains a better sense of what USF medical students and educators are already experiencing. In addition, she will likely keep teaching.

“I can’t imagine not teaching or seeing patients,” Dr. DeWaay said. “Patients, students and residents constantly remind me why I became an academic physician and the great responsibility I have to serve both groups with enthusiasm and excellence.”

Photos by Eric Younghans, USF Health Office of Communications.

This is the first story in a series highlighting faculty who are shining examples of quality and compassionate patient care and patient safety. Every day, these health care providers put their patients first. In the process, they create successful models of advanced care focused on empathy, safety, technology and evidenced-based medicine, models that carry through everything they do – into their practice, their teaching, their research, their community outreach, and into the USF Physicians Group.

It’s in Dr. Lucy Guerra’s genes to be completely drawn in to the team-based patient care offered at USF Health. Her own Latino heritage includes a close-knit family that is involved in nearly every aspect of life, including each other’s health.

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Knowing she is living true to who she is, she practices team-based medicine every day, putting her patients first, reinforcing the concept to medical students and residents she teaches, and watching the students, in turn, practice it as they provide free care to the local underserved community at the BRIDGE Clinic.

Dr. Lucy Guerra in the midst of teaching medical students and residents at the Morsani Center for Advanced Healthcare.

Dr. Guerra wears multiple hats in her career as a physician. She is associate professor, director of the Division of General Internal Medicine in the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine, co-faculty mentor for the BRIDGE Clinic, and associate director of the Internal Medicine Residency Program.

She doesn’t see them as multiple roles, but as one job, she said, a testament to her preference for working at an academic medical center.

“We all need to change our concept of what medical care is and to think of it as having evolved to a very patient-centric model,” Dr. Guerra said. “It’s more about working as a team to provide the best care and realizing the patient is part of that team. It’s a trend we call value-based care. When patients come to a place like USF Health, they’re going to always meet with the physician and other health care providers – a nurse practitioner, social worker, pharmacist or physician assistant – and it’s always going to include medical students and residents because we are an academic teaching institution.”

But an academic medical center is more than patient care and Dr. Guerra is emphatic in her efforts to incorporate USF Health’s other missions into her world.

“Our other missions – research and teaching—are equally important to patient care because you really can’t do one well without the other,” she said. “If we don’t have the research component then we can’t find better drug therapies and better behavioral therapies to treat patients. And sometimes I think this needs to be emphasized more because patients don’t necessarily realize that. The research part is very ethereal – you just don’t see it in action. Patients think of research as being done in the lab. But when you’re coming here, to an academic institution, you have the opportunity to participate in research studies and get involved. If patients realize they can participate in some kind of research study that will make a difference for the next generation of patients that come after them then wow, what a contribution they’ve made to medicine, as well to the future of their own grandchildren.”

For the teaching mission, Dr. Guerra said that, beyond the science of medicine, she tries to remind her students and residents why they chose medicine as a career.

“People who are learning and in a learning environment sometimes get caught up, just like I did, in studying or trying to get good grades or trying to pass, and you have to keep reminding them why they chose this profession,” she said. “For a physician, a nurse or anyone working in health care, it really needs to be a commitment. You’re making a commitment to somebody else – the patient. If you can ground a student in that, then they’re going to be the better health care provider for it.”

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She conveys that same philosophy to her colleagues, urging them to always remember why they went into medicine, to do their best to block out the added duties, patient charts, and demanding schedules and return to their core reasons for choosing medicine as a career.

Sometimes, she said, it’s as simple as looking at the young and eager medical students and residents to reignite the passions that carried them through medical school.

“Participating in things like BRIDGE, or teaching students and residents, can remind them why they went into health care to begin with,” Dr. Guerra said. “They’re seeing what they were a few years before or a decade before. And that’s the difference we find working at an academic medical center, where you have a lot of younger people around all the time from different disciplines.”

What keeps her motivated, staying on track with a demanding career? Among many things, she looks to her own father, who was a physician in Cuba and Spain before coming to America.

“I admire my father because he was always studying, learning English and trying to pass the medical boards here,” she said. “And he was older when he did that, in his late 30s, and worked three jobs during that same time. I just thought if someone could care so much about something, that’s what I’d like to do.”

Photos and multimedia story by Sandra C. Roa, USF Health Office of Communications. 

While today’s physician doesn’t carry a bag full of devices for examining and treating patients – like those of a hundred years ago – they do carry a repository of tools based on experiences and challenges that forms who they are as doctors.

Remembering to use those tools will make you a better doctor, said Bryan Bognar, MD, MPH, FACP, vice dean for educational affairs.

Dr. Bryan Bognar.

“Those bags are icons of the medical profession and you, as emerging health care providers, will need a similar collection of tools in your own careers,” he said.

Dr. Bognar was the keynote speaker at this year’s USF Health Morsani College of Medicine Scholarly Concentration Student Symposium, and his analogy helped students see the need for them to pull from their own work, experiences, and challenges within the Scholarly Concentrations Program to help them become better doctors.

Dr. Bognar urged students to make today’s “tool belt” a mix of enduring traits (diagnostic ability, medications, technology, spirit of inquiry, humanism, and professionalism) with emerging traits (inter-professionalism and team building, leadership, information technologies, personalized medicine, globalization, and knowledge of healthcare systems).

Held Oct. 18, the Student Symposium is an opportunity for the mostly second- and third-year medical students to present their preliminary research data. Their projects will likely become their capstone project that culminates their work in their fourth year, so the event is somewhat like a practice run.

This 5th annual symposium featured 28 presentations by medical students participating in the faculty-mentored Scholarly Concentration Program, a college wide program that provides medical students with an elective minor, of sorts, in one of 10 areas, providing them with opportunities for academic endeavors in areas of special interest. The concentrations are:  Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Business in Medicine; Health Disparities; Health Systems Engineering; International Medicine; Law and Medicine; Medical Education; Medical Humanities; Medicine and Gender; Public Health; and Research.

Each concentration includes elements of course work, practical application, and scholarly presentation and allows for self-directed learning, enhances interactions between students and fosters relationships between students and faculty.

Some of this year’s 28 medical student presenters with Dr. Bognar (center).

Following Dr. Bognar’s address, the students presented their work. Topics included the mechanics of disease, community involvement, health issues in poor communities, and medical education. Students and their topics included the following:

Matthew Applebaum: “Does a Wider Margin for a 1.0 -2.0 mm Melanoma Lead to Improvement in Oncologic and Cosmetic Outcomes?”

Jessica Glover: “The Effect of Margin Widths in Recurrence and Survival of Breast Conservation Therapy Patients”

Tess Chase: “A Critical Examination of the Biopsychosocial Implications of Pediatric Epilepsy in Germany and the United States”

Latashia-Lika Lelea: “Physician’s and Traditional Healer’s Perspectives, Use, and Effectiveness of Complementary and Alternative Medicine in American Samoa to Help Raise Cultural Awareness and Sensitivity in Mainstream Medical Practices”

Sayeef Mirza: “Knowledge, Attitude and Practice on Coronary Artery Disease among Cardiovascular Patients: A KAP Study in Dhaka, Bangladesh”

Blake Housley: “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act: Cost and Eligibility Model of Medicaid Expansion”

Spencer Bezalel: “Store-and-Forward Teledermatology Improves Access to Care in a VA Dermatology Clinic”

Danielle Grams: “New Frontiers for Medication Safety in Gansu, China”

Hussain Basrawala and Khalil Nasser: “SONOSTATION: A Modern Approach to Image Guided Surgical Intervention”

Maria Echavarria: “Comparative Study of Segmentectomy versus Lobectomy for Lung Cancer Patients via Robotic-Assisted Video Thoracoscopic (RATS) Surgery”

Ashok Shiani: “Degree of Concordance between Single Balloon Enteroscopy and Capsule Endoscopy for Obscure Gastrointestinal Bleeding after an Initial Positive Capsule”

Meghana Vellanki: “Buried Balloon: A Novel Complication from Percutaneous Radiologic Gastrostomy Tube Placement”

Jennifer Le: “Asymmetric Synthesis of Amitifadine via Metalloradical Catalysis”

Paolina Pantcheva: “Treating Non-Motor Symptoms of Parkinson’s Disease with Transplantation of Mesenchymal Stem Cells”

Yumeng Zhang: “TCA Cycle-Enhancing Metabolite Supplementation Improves Mitochondrial Function in a Parkinson’s Disease Cell Model”

Robert Ackerman, Shaara Argo and Jennifer Carrion: “Pre-Health Summer Enrichment Program 2014”

Mariella Disturco: “Development and Implantation of a Multidisciplinary Curriculum for Women whom are Obese During Pregnancy”

Shawna Foley: “Mothers for Mutare: Community-Based RUTF Manufacture and Nutrition Training for Relief of Pediatric Malnutrition in Mutare, Zimbabwe”

Jessica Patel, Sonali Ranjit and Nick Kovacs: “Outcomes of Innovation Education and Training for Heath Care Students”

Alexander Glaser and Shaunn Hussey: “Progression from Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever to Dengue Shock Syndrome: A Predictive Model”

Nicole Teal: “forwardHEALTH: A University-NGO Partnership for Community-Based Global Health”

Holly O’Brien: “forwardHEALTH: Youth Empowerment and Education”

Photos by Eric Younghans, USF Health Office of Communications

Eight years ago, Bryan Bognar, MPH, MD, was deep in the middle of preparing for reaccreditation for the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine. Committees, data collection, lengthy reports and in-depth self-study filled his days for nearly a year.

Today, Dr. Bognar is once again deep in the middle accreditation as the medical school prepares for its next site visit by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) early next year.  Although the familiarity makes for a faster learning curve, it won’t slow the pace or reduce the volume of work, said Dr. Bognar, who was recently named vice dean of the Office of Educational Affairs for the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine (MCOM).

“Having gone through the accreditation process is a tremendous advantage, but a lot has changed at MCOM since the last accreditation cycle,” said Dr. Bognar, who started the job March 3. “But the beauty of the LCME visit and associated preparation is that it offers us an opportunity to take a hard look in the mirror and see how we’re doing. What we discover is that there is a long list of strengths so it’s a chance to celebrate the things we are doing well. There also will be opportunities for improvement.”

The LCME reaccredited MCOM for a full eight years in 2007. Its decision for the next accreditation comes in 2015.

USF Health has had a number of new initiatives since Dr. Bognar left the Office of Educational Affairs roughly five years ago, including the College of Pharmacy, an expanded master’s program, shared student services (The Well) and the SELECT MD program. One of USF Health’s strong differentiators, Dr. Bognar said, is the ever-growing inter-professional education efforts across USF Health.

The LCME recognizes the importance of incorporating inter-professional education (IPE) experiences in students’ curriculum, Dr. Bognar said.

“IPE is a very important aspect of what makes USF Health unique,” he said. “Our students have a genuine thirst for knowledge for what other health professionals contribute to patient care. They need to come away with an appreciation of how the pieces fit together.”

His own clinical experiences will likely play into the IPE efforts at USF Health, for both the LCME visit and for the long term.

“I spent three and a half years practicing within a very interdisciplinary environment at Moffitt Cancer Center,” he said. “I’ve seen it affect patient outcomes in a very real way, on a day-to-day basis. It’s like an orchestra, with each health professional bringing their own expertise, experience, and perspective on what the patient needs are. The patient care plan that comes from that interaction is critical; when done well it works seamlessly.”

And with health care continually changing, the need for training in teams has never been greater, he said.

“There is a complexity of modern-day patient care and it requires flexible, interdisciplinary care models. The more and earlier we can expose students to that, the better.”

That attitude helps USF MCOM students see Dr. Bognar as a great asset, for both the impending LCME visit and for continued positive interactions with students.

“Medical students are ecstatic for his return,” said Neil Manimala, president of the MCOM Student Council. “Dr. Bognar’s dedication to the student body is incredible. When we met first met with him to better acquaint him with key student concerns right after he was selected, he was already aware of most of the developments that have happened since he left USF Health. He stayed with us for two and a half hours, making sure to gather details on the direction the students want our institution to be headed.  I have the utmost confidence that under his leadership, we’ll be on that student-centered track, and subsequently we’ll come out of the LCME re-accreditation process a stronger community.”

The confidence in Dr. Bognar to champion MCOM students carries through to the administration, as well. In his letter notifying students of Dr. Bognar taking the vice dean of education position, MCOM Interim Dean Harry van Loveren noted:

“I could not be happier that Dr. Bognar agreed to take on this new role. His teaching abilities are widely recognized and admired by our leadership, our faculty, and by you, our students. In fact, when I first broke the news to a few of your student leaders yesterday, their joy was palpable – as if they had won a prize. And I believe they have. Dr. Bognar knows and appreciates our history and culture. I am confident about his abilities to lead us through the upcoming accreditation process for the Liaison Committee on Medical Education. Dr. Bognar, who received an MPH from our own College of Public Health, also has a deep understanding of our cooperative and inter-professional culture across USF Health. Dr. Bognar has said that he’s ‘absolutely thrilled’ to be returning to Educational Affairs. He asked us to let you know that he will put his heart and soul into working with you again and making your educational experience the best that it can be.”

So what’s after LCME accreditation? Dr. Bognar is taking it one step at a time.

“We’re not starting anything new just yet,” he said, smiling. “We’re focusing on the things in front of us. We want ensure that the changes that have already been made have an opportunity to develop deep roots and are sustainable. So they bear fruit for years to come.”

Dr. Bognar earned his MD from the Indiana University of School of Medicine, a BSc from the University of Notre Dame, and an MPH from the USF College of Public Health. He is a former chief resident at the James A. Haley Veterans’ Hospital and completed a two-year fellowship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He has received several teaching awards from USF and received the American College of Physicians – American Society of Internal Medicine Outstanding Teacher of the Year Award in 2002.

In 2009, Dr. Bognar was associate dean for undergraduate medical education and interim vice dean for the MCOM Office of Educational Affairs before transitioning to Moffitt Cancer Center, where he was Chair of Internal Medicine and maintained a faculty appointment with MCOM to continue teaching students and residents.

Reflecting on his path back to the Office of Educational Affairs, Dr. Bognar noted that his road was always on course for teaching.

“I am grateful for the opportunity to come back,” he said. “It is not only an honor to be able to take care of patients, but also to help educate others on how to take care of patients.”

Story by Sarah Worth, photos by Eric Younghans, USF Health Office of Communications. 

Ron Swinfard, MD, president and CEO of Leigh Valley Health Network, presents USF SELECT MD student Kirk Chassey, with a lab coat during the May 6 orientation ceremony. The coats were presented to all 18 students arriving from USF to begin their two years of clinical education at LVHN.

 Click here for update on USF SELECT students at Lehigh Valley Health Network

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Holding his baby daughter in one arm, Keith O’Brien directs movers with the other arm toward boxes he needs loaded onto a truck.

He is one of 18 USF second-year medical students packing up their homes in Tampa to move to Allentown, PA, where they will spend the next two years in clinical rotations at the Lehigh Valley Health Network (LVHN) as part of USF’s innovative SELECT (Scholarly Excellence. Leadership Experience. Collaborative Training) Program.

The program, which welcomed its charter class in Fall 2011, is part of the MD program at the USF Morsani College of Medicine. The specialized track gives SELECT students unique training in leadership development, intense coaching, and the scholarly tools they need to become empathetic, passionate physician leaders who will be catalysts for change.

USF partnered with LVHN for the SELECT program to combine key strengths of both institutions: USF Health is known for its patient-centric, innovative medical curriculum and Lehigh Valley is recognized as one of the best community hospital systems in the nation.

While the entire Class of 2015 is transitioning into third-year clinical rotations – a shift from predominately classroom work into patient exam rooms – these 18 SELECT students are the first to make a 1,100-mile move to begin that transition.

1,100-Mile Journey

O’Brien and his wife Patty are moving with their 4-month-old daughter Claire. For this new family, the move to Pennsylvania is a bit of a homecoming.

“We’re from New York and both Patty and I went to school in Lafayette (PA), which is only about 10 minutes from Allentown,” O’Brien said. “Needless to say, our parents are thrilled we’re coming back, especially the baby. It will be nice to be near family.”

It’s a road back home for Emma Webb, as well.

“Our family is so excited we’re coming back,” said Webb, whose husband Mustafa and 6-year-old daughter Samantha are going, too. “They were pretty upset that I was taking their granddaughter away for two years.”

Emma Webb and daughter Samantha pack up toys they’re taking to Allentown.

 Aresh Ramin is also going home.

“I truly enjoyed my time in Tampa, but I look forward to going back,” said Ramin, who is from Boston and worked at LVHN between undergraduate school and medical school.

Aresh Ramin packs his apartment before hitting the road north.

But for some of the 18, the trip means leaving home.

“We’re looking at it as a great adventure,” said Alexandra Printz, who grew up mostly in Florida and earned her bachelor’s degree from USF. She is moving to Allentown with husband George and their two children, 6-year-old Ari and 4-year-old Vaughn. “This will be a big move for all of us, but especially for the kids, who have only lived here. But they have a bit of a transition themselves. They will spend most of the summer with their grandparents and dad George in Sarasota and go to summer camps before they make the move to Allentown.”

Alexandra Printz, who grew up in Florida, is moving with her  family to Allentown.

Frontline for Medical Education

The charter class of SELECT is embarking on the first program of its kind to train future physician leaders, a milestone that is front and center for Stephen K. Klasko, MD, MBA, CEO of USF Health and dean of the USF Morsani College of Medicine.

“All of our USF Health students are unique,” Dr. Klasko said. “These 18 pioneers are willing to go where no medical students have gone before… where their clinical training is over a thousand miles away and their curriculum is based on the transformations of a very different healthcare future.  They are the inaugural group of students helping us blaze the trail for the new medical education model, for the new way doctors will be taught and trained. This is how medical education is changing, and they are innovators, pacesetters, and leaders.”

SELECT student O’Brien is also keenly aware of the distinction.

“It’s a special feeling about what they’re doing,” O’Brien said. “There is something so unique about this program. The training, the extra effort taken to provide the experiences that will make us strong leaders. I appreciate the extra effort. The way we’re training doctors is changing and the SELECT program is on the front of the curve of that change.”

Ramin agrees.

“SELECT truly changed my life and is helping me grow,” said Ramin, who worked in LVHN as a nurse’s aide when he heard about the SELECT program at the employee orientation session, and didn’t hesitate applying. “I’m getting experiences that all medical students get, but SELECT goes beyond just the medical aspect. I’m learning about leadership, the healthcare system, and patient-centered care.”

And so does Sasha Yakhkind.

“What I’ve enjoyed about SELECT is that they ask for our ideas and opinions for how things are going because it’s so new,” Yakhkind said. “It’s an honor to give feedback, to be heard.”

New Beginnings

It’s been a quick two years for the medical students in the SELECT program. Beyond the packing, the trip to Allentown is about new beginnings. Common among all  the students are feelings of nervousness and excitement.

“It’s a surprise and surprises are good,” Ramin said. “It will be a totally different experience being out of classroom and in patient situations. But I’ll see all of my friends again and have all of my friends from Tampa. It will be a different chapter.”

“I’m super, super excited for the clinical aspect of it,” Yakhkind said. “Allentown is more rural than Tampa. But we’re a train ride away from New York City. And I’ll miss some of my closest friends, fellow medical students who are staying here in Tampa.”

“It’s a brave new world,” Printz said. “It’s an incredible experience to be connected to two incredible institutions.”

“The two years really go quickly,” O’Brien said. “And now it’s ‘Wow! This is really happening.’  We all just get the feeling Allentown is going to roll out the red carpet for us.”

And what’s in store when they get to Allentown?  This Monday morning, May 6, the SELECT inaugural class will be welcomed to Allentown by Dr. Ronald Swinfard, president and CEO of Lehigh Valley Health Network. The students will meet the LVHN clinical faculty and be presented with new white coats that they will wear over the next two years of their clinical education.

New Traditions

As a charter group, the SELECT students are forming traditions for the next generation to follow. For this move north, current first-year SELECT students helped second-year students (soon to be third-year students), pack up.

 First-year medical students helped the Printz family load for their move to Allentown. Standing in the truck are Kirk Chassey and Alexandra Printz. On the ground,  are from left, Mary Kate Erdman, Neil Manimala, Samson Lu, Joe Stidham (top), Rachel Fieman (bottom), and Tom Fowler.

Charter USF SELECT MD students with Alan Otuski, MD,(far left), associate dean of educational affairs for SELECT, and LVHN President and CEO Ron Swinfard, MD (far right). The students will spend their third and fourth years of medical school at LVHN doing classroom study, medical simulations, regular hospital rotations and primary care practice assignments.

Story by Sarah A. Worth, photos by Eric Younghans and Klaus Herdocia, USF Health Office of Communications.

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The second group of students arrived this week for USF Health’s SELECT MD program, which chooses medical students based on criteria beyond the traditional science GPA and MCAT scores.

At 44 strong, the SELECT cohort of the Morsani College of Medicine Class of 2016 is more than double that of last year’s inaugural group of 19.  They emerged from 1,100 applicants interested in SELECT as among the best matches for the program, which seeks students with high emotional intelligence, including the empathy, creativity and passion to change patient care, the health of communities and the medical profession.  

At the USF Health CAMLS Virtual Patient Care Center, incoming SELECT MD student Kristian Johnson, left, interviews standardized patient Alicia Menzies during an exercise that draws upon the principles of emotional intelligence. Observing in the background are student Peter Hwu and Dr. Kristan Bresnan of the Lehigh Valley Health Network.

The success of first-year year students in blazing the SELECT trail is evident in the stellar backgrounds of the new students, who come from such institutions as Stanford, Emory, Georgetown and the University of Pennsylvania.

“I’m extremely proud of all our accepted students, including the SELECT group,” said Stephen Klasko, MD, MBA, dean of the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine and CEO of USF Health.  “They are impressive young people who truly will change the face of healthcare. They are proof of what a success SELECT has already become.”

SELECT student Jamie Dyal,left, practices his injection technique (without actually dispensing medication) with assistance from fellow medical student Keith Groshans. The faculty-supervised orientation activity at CAMLS gave  students a chance to  practice basic skills used during health fairs.

Positive feedback from the inaugural group of students and faculty mentors led to SELECT’s accelerated growth over the last year, Alicia Monroe, MD, the college’s vice dean for educational affairs, said in a Tampa Tribune article this June.  Eventually, the college expects to admit 56 SELECT students a year, in addition to a core medical class of 120 students. Dr. Monroe said

The SELECT program’s emphasis on emotional intelligence and how it relates to effective leadership appealed to Kristian Johnson, 25, of Eagleville, PA.  Johnson organized and participated in an NYU student volunteer relief and clean-up effort along the Gulf Coast following Hurricane Katrina, and ran the New York City Marathon to raise money for cancer research.

“SELECT was exactly what I was looking for,” Johnson said. “I believe it’s very important for physicians to be able to put themselves in their patients’ shoes and understand the challenges people face in negotiating the healthcare system.  To be an effective leader you need to connect with your patients and the team you work with.”

SELECT students Nick James and Rachel Snow at one of the blood glucose monitoring stations.

Johnson conducted research in interventional radiology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in NYC for more than two years and for a summer at Stanford Medical Center. But, she has also worked several summers as a physical therapy aide and nursing assistant to help pay for her education.

“These are tough jobs that often go unnoticed, but having had that experience gives me a better perspective about the importance of every member of the healthcare team.”

In addition to Johnson, who holds an interdisciplinary MS degree in medical science from USF, the second class of SELECT students includes:

• Jamie Dyal, 26, of Sarasota, did his undergraduate work at Stanford University and recently completed a master’s degree in bioethics from the University of Pennsylvania. His honors thesis explored factors that affect the end-of-life decision making and medical care of terminally ill physicians. Dyal has made several clinical service mission trips to Ghana and Uganda, Africa.
• Elizabeth Ciaravino, 23, a Georgetown University graduate who grew up in Tampa, is trilingual (English, Spanish and Italian).  Ciaravino was an American Cancer Society Fellow in Dr. Daniel Sullivan’s research laboratory at Moffitt Cancer Center. She has served as a reading and writing tutor in Washington, DC schools, helped set up mobile medical clinics for health screenings on a medical mission trip to Costa Rica, and painted houses and planted sustainable gardens as a volunteer in the Dominican Republic.
• Michael Goodwin, 21, who grew up in Allentown, PA, has a bachelors’s degree in physics from St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia. He worked in radiation oncology research at University of Pennsylvania Hospital to help design a new laser delivery apparatus. Fluent in sign language, Goodwin has worked as both a Special Olympics and hospice volunteer.

New student Elizabeth Ciaravino in one of the standardized patient exam rooms at USF Health CAMLS.

 They all echo Johnson’s enthusiasm about following in the footsteps of the first class – the SELECT pioneers who will help to mentor the new students along with faculty.  And, as they integrate into the core Class of 2016, they are eager to leave their own imprint.

“I’d hope we can take the best of SELECT and build upon the great foundation that has been created for us,” Johnson said.

The 44 SELECT MD students in the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine’s Class of 2016 emerged from 1,100 applicants.

Incoming SELECT medical students toured USF Health CAMLS.

 – Photos and Video by Eric Younghans, USF Health Communications