The first time Gayle Woodson, MD, went on an international otolaryngology outreach mission 15 years ago, she was “a little afraid to go.” The chair of otolaryngology at Southern Illinois University in Springfield was traveling to Tanzania, a country prone to violence and war, and there was no telling what kind of environment she was entering.
Like many physicians, otolaryngologists at mid-career may experience some form of burnout and be looking to make a professional shift. Indeed, a study published in the Annals of Surgery last year found that otolaryngologists had high rates of career burnout that paralleled those of trauma and vascular surgeons.
Dr. Sims has eloquently identified the value of diversity not only in otolaryngology, but also its contribution to the strength of the U.S. as a nation. Drs. Kuppersmith and Thomas have responded to his editorial indicating steps that the AAO-HNS has taken and is currently taking to increase diversity.
My Viewpoint was intended to call attention to a problem and inspire us to act with more alacrity.
We read with great interest Dr. Steven Sim’s recent op-ed, “More of the Same: Why isn’t otolaryngology becoming more diverse?” in ENT Today (Viewpoint, Sept. 2010).
The new duty hour regulation from the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) that limits first-year residents to 16-hour shifts has drawn a conflicted chorus of reactions from attendings, who have only seven months before the stipulation goes into effect.
One of the features weíve added to ENT Today since our new publishing partnership with Wiley-Blackwell has been concise, to-the-point reviews of some of the most important articles in the literature. Our editorial board members have been responsible for the most recent reviews in our ìLiterature Reviewî department, but the Triological Society has established a new committee of outstanding individuals who will scan the literature and write the summaries you read in ENT Today.
With greater scrutiny of doctors and easier access to information about doctors’ education, the American Board of Otolaryngology’s Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program is more important than ever, said Robert Miller, MD, executive director of the American Board of Otolaryngology (ABOto).
In an address to the 2009 Combined Otolaryngological Spring Meetings in Las Vegas, neurosurgeon Harry Van Loveren, MD, chair of the department of neurosurgery at the University of South Florida, coined the term “fogeyphobia” to describe a tendency among older doctors to become reluctant to speak out against new surgical tools and techniques, out of fear of being viewed as old-fashioned.
A physician who was recently offered a lucrative position with an otolaryngology practice in his community asked me to review his current employment agreement to determine if it contained any prohibitions against accepting the job. His previous employment contract contained a noncompetition clause that, justifiably, caused him and his prospective employer some concern. As it turned out, in his case, and in many others, the noncompetition clause was not as restrictive as it appeared at first glance. The provision was penetrable and my client joined the new practice with a clear conscience that he was not in violation of his previous contract.