2018 AUPN Fall Chairs Sessions

2018 Fall Chairs Courses
(In conjunction with ANA)

October 21-23, 2018
Hyatt Regency Hotel
265 Peachtree St NW, Atlanta, GA 30303
Rooms: Regency VII (all threes sessions)

Sunday, October 21, 2018 – 7:30 am – 9:00 am
SESSION I: Burnout in Academic Neurology: How bad is it, and what can we do to prevent it?

Faculty:

L. John Greenfield, Jr., MD, PhD, Professor and Chair, Dept. of Neurology, University of Connecticut School of Medicine/UConn Health; PowerPoint Presentation
Patrick Reynolds, MD, Professor of Neurology, Wake Forest University; PowerPoint Presentation

Course Description:
Career dissatisfaction among healthcare providers is reaching epidemic proportions, with more than 50 % of practitioners suffering symptoms of burnout. This may be particularly true for academic physicians who face the additional burdens of performing research, writing papers and grants, administrative duties and teaching medical students and residents. Burnout involves loss of the feeling that one’s work is important, valued and meaningful. It damages the physician patient relationship, causing depersonalization and loss of the vital connection and the pleasure of patient interactions. Career dissatisfaction may reduce clinical and academic productivity, can lead to depression and induce physicians to leave academics or medicine entirely. These effects are magnified in the academic setting due to the loss of potential lifesaving research and the cascading effect of poor satisfaction on the training of medical students and residents. Dr. John Greenfield will present results from a survey of clinical faculty at UConn Health and its ramifications for academic departments. Dr. Patrick Reynolds will discuss burnout among Neurology residents and ongoing efforts to understand and mitigate this problem. The focus will be to provide tools for improving career satisfaction among academic neurologists and neurologists in training.

Learning Objectives:

Describe the effects of burnout on academic clinicians.
List factors associate with burnout among academic clinical faculty, and possible remedies.
Discuss strategies for detecting, mitigating and preventing burnout in Neurology residents.

Monday, October 22, 2018 – 7:30 am – 9:00 am
SESSION II: Creating a Culture within your Neurology Department

Faculty:

Gregory L. Holmes, MD, Professor and Chair, Department of Neurological Sciences, University of Vermont College of Medicine; PowerPoint Presentation
Robin Brey, MD, Professor and Chair, Department of Neurology, University of Texas San Antonio; PowerPoint Presentation

Course Description:
The job of running an academic department has been compared to herding cats; faculty members have their own individual strengths and weaknesses, goals and needs, and if left alone tend to pursue their own interests with little regard for the overall goals of the department chair or the institution. Departmental goals may include high levels of clinical performance, improved research grant and publication productivity, outstanding educational achievement and improved financial performance. Aligning faculty and department goals to ensure consistently high level of performance across these missions can be challenging, particularly since large institutions may be inflexible and resources limited. How does a department chair create a culture of high performance, career satisfaction and engagement in which faculty members see their contributions to each of these missions as vital and important? How do you maintain this culture despite declining clinical reimbursements, lower grant funding rates, and increased educational expectations? What does it take to create a culture of excellence? Dr. Robin Brey will present her approach to creating culture in a large urban medical center, and Dr. Gregory Holmes will discuss the challenges posed within a smaller rural department. For those new to these concepts or who want to know more, see the recommended reading below which presents a nice synthesis of critical concepts as well as specific strategies for group leaders.

Learning Objectives:

Discuss strategies for aligning faculty and departmental/institutional interests.
Describe ways to encourage faculty members to view themselves as members of a team rather than individual practitioners or researchers.
Discuss approaches to build collegiality, camaraderie and esprit de corps.

Recommended Reading:
“The Culture Code: The Secrets of Highly Successful Groups” by Daniel Coyle, Bantam Books, 2018.

Tuesday, October 23, 2018 – 7:00 am – 8:30 am
SESSION III: Faculty Recruitment and Retention: Lessons and Strategies

Faculty:

Allison Brashear, MD, Professor and Chair of Neurology, Wake Forest University School of Medicine PowerPoint Presentation
Frances Jensen, MD, Professor and Chair, Dept. of Neurology, Univ. of Pennsylvania PowerPoint Presentation
Matthew Rizzo, MD, Francis & Edgar Reynolds Chair & Professor, Dept of Neurological Sciences, University of Nebraska
Sanjay Singh, MD, Professor and Chair, Dept. of Neurology, Creighton University School of Medicine; PowerPoint Presentation
David Standaert, MD, PhD, John N. Whitaker Professor and Chair, Dept of Neurology, Univ. of Alabama, Birmingham; PowerPoint Presentation
Gretchen Tietjen, MD, Professor and Chair, Dept. of Neurology, University of Toledo

Course Description:
One of the most important jobs for a department chair is recruiting and retaining high functioning, productive faculty. Every department has its own advantages and challenges in recruiting faculty, and each chair has something different and beneficial to share. Rather than have one or two speakers discuss their strategies, successes and failures that may be unique to the circumstances of their institution, we will have 8 chairs from a variety of regions and institution styles (eg. research intensive vs. clinically intensive, small vs. large, urban vs. rural) who will speak for about 5-10 minutes each and present one or two vignettes with no more than 3 powerpoint slides. Topics for discussion will include:

advertising and/or use of headhunters
major retention issues and how you resolved them,
how you compete when a candidate has multiple offers,
differing strategies for recruiting clinician scientists, full time researchers or full time clinicians,
how to recruit for diversity,
salary issues and disparities among subspecialties,
joint recruitments of married faculty pairs,
fitting the job to the candidate vs the candidate to the job,
other related questions

There should be ample time for audience questions and discussion.

Learning Objectives:

Describe several strategies for recruiting outstanding research-intensive or clinical-intensive faculty.
List successful strategies for retaining faculty who may be considering positions elsewhere.
Describe techniques for successful recruitment of diverse candidates, married couples, and those with less common situations or needs.