Spring 2019: Master of Education in the Health Professions Update

Recruitment For New Faculty Member

We have started a search to identify a new full-time faculty member in health professions education to join the MEHP program. If you know of someone who would be interested in teaching in our program, supporting fellows and alumni, and conducting research in health professions education, please share her/his name and contact information with Toni immediately as the search is moving rapidly.

MEHP Director, Students Present at AERA Meeting

Kudos to MEHP Director Toni Ungaretti, PhD, who chaired the Teaching and Learning Community Meeting for the American Educational Research Association (AERA)’s annual meeting in Toronto. Ungaretti organized a symposium on scholarly approaches to evaluating health professions education advanced degree programs, featuring speakers from Kings College London, the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Hong Kong, and the Cleveland Clinic and Cleveland State University. She also presented on a formative evaluation of the MEHP program and lessons learned. Ungaretti also founded and leads the Health Professions Education Advanced Degree Program Research Group, which convened during the conference.

Two MEHP Fellows presented papers at the conference. Priyanka Dwivedi, MA, presented a paper on establishing a quality control for residency applicant scores. She is administrative director for medical education in the Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine at Johns Hopkins. Michael Banks, MD, an assistant professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine at Johns Hopkins, presented a paper on assessing the attitudes and perceptions of postgraduate physicians on interprofessional education and collaboration.

MEHP Excellence Award Winners

Congratulations to Stephen Sozio, MD, MEHP ‘17, the 2019 recipient of the Outstanding MEHP Alumnus Award, and to Joanne Rolls, PA, MEHP Fellow, the 2019 recipient of the MEHP Fellow Excellence Award.

Sozio, an associate professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins, started in the inaugural cohort of the MEHP program, has taught in the Adult Learning Course since 2013, and serves as a leader in multiple courses for medical students, advising programs, fellows and faculty. This is in addition to his national and international work within education, including leading the Students and Residents (STARS) program for the American Society of Nephrology and teaching in six other countries.

Sozio serves in multiple educational leadership roles at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, including serving as course co-director for the epidemiology course for first-year medical students, faculty leader in the Colleges Advisory Program, co-director of the Scholarly Concentration in Clinical Research Program, and associate program director of the Nephrology Fellowship Program.

Sozio has received several teaching awards at Johns Hopkins, including the W. Barry Wood Jr. Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2018, awarded annually to the teachers voted by the students in the preclinical years to have been most inspirational and/or effective. He was nominated for the MEHP award by former student Rachel Salas, MD, MEHP ’18, an associate professor of neurology at Johns Hopkins.

Rolls, a physician assistant and assistant clinical professor with the University of Utah’s Department of Family and Preventive Medicine, created a Capstone project to investigate current curricular approaches to transgender health education in United States physician assistant programs. The research questions involve assessing program and faculty characteristics and comprehensively assessing the curriculum, hours dedicated, and barriers involved in training future physician assistants in transgender healthcare. These questions were selected from a national submission competition to be included on the Physician Assistant Education Association (PAEA) annual program survey, sent to all 236 PA programs in the U.S. in 2018. For her work, Rolls earned the PAEA’s 2018 Support to Advance Research (STAR) Program award.

Rolls worked with several coinvestigators including former MEHP faculty member John Davis, MD, PhD, an associate professor at the University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine. In addition, Rolls received an internal award of $5,000 for this project through the University of Utah’s Department of Family and Preventive Medicine.

“Jo is an excellent example of how MEHP training can provide the necessary skills to progress health professionals’ education and allow them to become national leaders in education,” said Marjorie Jenkins, MD, MEHP ‘15, her Capstone advisor, who nominated her for the award. “In addition, her work ethic and commitment to excelling throughout the MEHP program has been unwavering.”

Salas Nominated for Macy Scholars Program

The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine nominated MEHP alumna Rachel Salas, MD, MEHP ‘18, an associate professor of neurology, for the 2019 Macy Faculty Scholars Program. Macy Faculty Scholars receive salary support up to $100,000 per year over two years to implement an educational change project in their institutions. Scholars also receive mentoring and career advice. Salas’ project focuses on advancing interprofessional education among Johns Hopkins faculty so leaders in medicine, nursing and pharmacy can serve as collaborative practice teachers and role models to serve either prelicensure or postlicensure students.

AlFalasi Stars in Abu Dhabi Documentary

MEHP Fellow Reem AlFalasi, MBBCh, a resident at UMMC and Abu Dhabi native, will be featured in the “Ayal Zayed-Children of Zayed” documentary for Abu Dhabi TV. The program will discuss the experience of Emirati scholarship students and researchers in America, their journey to benefit from the American experience, and how they will apply their work when they return home. AlFalasi was nominated by the Embassy of the United Arab Emirates in Washington, D.C., for her work seeking to develop the scientific side of her country.

Le-Bucklin Garners Second AMA Grant, Presents at AAMC

Khanh-Van Le-Bucklin MD, MEHP ’19, vice dean of medical education and interim chair of pediatrics at the University of California, Irvine, School of Medicine, got a research boost. After initially receiving a $10,000 grant from the American Medical Association for her Capstone project, to develop a curriculum aimed at preventing medical student mistreatment by supervising faculty, the association recently awarded her an additional $45,000 grant to bring her curriculum to a consortium of schools. Le-Bucklin also was asked to present her project at the Association of American Medical Colleges’ (AAMC) Western Group on Educational Affairs meeting in March in Reno, Nev., and AAMC’s annual meeting this fall in Phoenix. Additionally, Le-Bucklin presented the work at the American Medical Association’s consortium meeting in April in Atlanta and will do so at AMA’s ChangeMedEd conference in September in Chicago.

Luan Receives ADEA Leadership Award

MEHP Fellow Kevin W. Luan, BDS, MS, a clinical assistant professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry, was honored at the American Dental Education Association’s annual meeting with a scholarship to attend the ADEA Summer Program for Emerging Academic Leaders.

Fazzio Wins Award for Capstone Project

Pamela Fazzio, MD, MEHP ‘19, a pediatric emergency medicine fellow at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, won an Excellence in Medical Education Oral Abstract Presentation Award from the Northeastern Group on Educational Affairs (NEGEA), a regional group of the Association of American Medical Colleges, for her Capstone project, “What Do You Want to Learn or Work on Today? Resident Self-identified Learning Goals in the Pediatric Emergency Department.” Fazzio also will present her project through posters and presentations at the Association of Pediatric Program Directors, Pediatric Academic Societies and Society for Academic Emergency Medicine meetings.

Tomobi Presents at Global Health Conference

MEHP Fellow Oluwakemi Tomobi, MD, an assistant professor of pediatrics at Johns Hopkins, presented a poster on the “Use of Rapid-cycle Deliberate Practice vs. Standard Simulation in Training Anesthesia Providers on the Universal Anesthesia Machine Ventilator in Sierra Leone” at the recent Unite for Sight Global Health & Innovation Conference at Yale University.

Hats Off to Our 2019 Graduates

The MEHP program congratulates all students who received their degrees during the 2018-2019 academic year. Following is a list of graduates and their capstone projects: