Dear faculty, staff, and students:

As you have probably noticed, things look a bit crowded around the College of Medicine these days. We have now welcomed both of our medical school classes back from their summer or White Coat break, both of our PA classes, our new graduate students, and many new faculty who have joined us. It is also that time of year when I go to “All Faculty Meetings” at each of our regional campuses with several members of our leadership team. While there, I usually provide a short summary of updates about the college and thank the community faculty in attendance for being so great with our clerkship students. I love telling our story and updating them on all of the great things going on in the college and thought that each of you might want to know these things too! It is ALL GOOD! So – in no particular order:

Medical Students
- The Class of 2022 joined us on May 29, along with 13 new Bridge students. They successfully completed their first semester and we had a great White Coat Ceremony on August 10 in Ruby Diamond. Brett Thomas (Class of 2014) was our guest speaker and it was great to welcome him back after completing his FM residency in NC.
- This Class of 2022 came from 7178 applications. We interviewed about 280 of them and made 169 offers to fill the class of 120. Once again, we are among the top 5 most selective medical schools in the US (2.3%).
- We also inducted 18 new Class of 2019 Gold Humanism Honor Society students into the FSU Chapman Chapter at White Coat to introduce our freshman to their future role models.
- Students are doing well in their USMLE Step exams to date:

• Class of 2019 – We have a 99% pass rate on Step II CK to date with 104 scores reported as of 8-30. I am very pleased to see the number of great scores as students get ready for residency interviews.
• Class of 2020 started Clerkships in May and have a 96.5% pass rate on Step 1 with 117 scores reported as of 8-28.

- The Class of 2021 returned on 20 August after their summer experiences. 24 served as TA’s in the CLC and anatomy lab this summer and 26 did summer research projects. Several others attended officer’s basic for their military programs or served as guides and advisors for the Summer Institute here.

PA students
- The Class of 2019 returned to us on 27 August after a hectic exam week and week off. They will report to the Regional Campuses in January for their clinical year and graduate in December 2019.
- The new Class of 2020 arrived on 21 August for Orientation week and started classes on 27 August. They were selected from over 1700 applications and we have a class size of 50 this year, increasing to 60 next year at full enrollment.

GME
- Our residency programs continue to grow and expand around the state. We are now approved for a combined 146 total positions and it was great to see the classroom 1306 full when we invited all of our new first year residents from each of our programs to Tallahassee for orientation in June.
- At Sarasota Memorial (SMH), the Internal Medicine program just welcomed their 2nd class of 13 residents. The Emergency Medicine residency has received provisional accreditation and will enter the 2019 Match.
- At Tallahassee Memorial (TMH), we welcomed our new Program Director, Dr. Claudia Kroker- Bode, to the Internal Medicine Program. The General Surgery program welcomed their third class this year and we are in discussions to start a Psychiatry program there.
- At Lee Health in Fort Myers, we have expanded the Family Medicine program to 8 residents per year and Dr. Alfred Gitu has assumed leadership of the program. Dr. Gitu had been the associate program director for family medicine there.
- We greatly appreciate the incredible service of our founding program directors, Drs. Gregory Todd and Gary Goforth at TMH and Lee Health respectively, each of whom began their service in 2012 as they move on to new roles.
- The FSU COM signed an affiliation agreement to begin a family medicine residency program at Winter Haven Hospital this spring. We have identified a founding Program Director, Dr. Nathan Falk, to officially join us September 21, and he is hard at work developing the new program application for accreditation.
Interdisciplinary Medical Science (IMS)
- The IMS, created in fall 2016, is now in its third year and already has around 850 majors in this popular program to provide pre-health students a home where they can experience various health careers, receive advice and guidance, and get the core fundamental courses to prepare them.
- It has added another level of traffic to the busy COM building as students are coming for seminars, add – drop, and pre-health advising.

Development
- As FSU closes the “Raise the Torch” Campaign at FSU, the College of Medicine raised over $44 million in gifts and pledges. We greatly appreciate the generosity and vision of our donors.
- Dance Marathon continues to grow and we share in the proceeds each year to support pediatric programs in the Tallahassee area. This year, the dancers raised over $2.3 million, half of which comes to the COM. We are using this to help support our pediatric outreach in Gadsden County and our new FSU PrimaryHealth clinic, along with support for the TMH pediatric unit, Big Bend Hospice, and Bond Community Health Center.
- Our priorities continue to be scholarships, professorships, support for our educational programs (e.g. Bridge and Summer Clinical Practicum) and our regional campuses.

Research
- We have had a great year of new faculty recruitments, research productivity, and success this year.
- We are working with UF now for their competitive renewal of the CTSA program, ONE Florida.
- The College of Medicine had a total of $102 million in Research awards as of July 2018, with an increase of $49.6 Million in the last FY, reflecting highly productive faculty receiving larger awards, mostly from federal sources.
Clinical Practices
- FSU SeniorHealth continues to grow with an outpatient primary care / consulting practice, inpatient services in skilled nursing facilities, house calls at local assisted senior living communities and clinical service agreements with several local agencies.
- Our FSU PrimaryHealth clinic in SW Tallahassee is under construction and slated to open in March 2019. We are establishing a clinic in Sabal Palm Elementary in the interim to begin to provide services to the children there.

I think you would agree that there are many things happening here at the college. I’ve been asked to present an update about the college next week at the Board of Trustees Meeting. And I will share many of our successes and “brag points” as noted above.

I’m very proud of the work you all do to create these wonderful bullets. Thanks to all of you who work so hard every day to help us achieve all these wonderful results.

Best wishes,

J. Fogarty
Dean

Dean’s Message

     These are challenging times for medical education in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. All of our M.D. and PA classes have been seriously affected.

• M1s and PA1s are both taking online courses in lieu of lectures, and our faculty are developing creative solutions to how to address clinical skills, decision-making and small-group activities.
   
• M2s were on study block, and the testing centers for Step 1 are closed for the next month, so we’re asking them to be flexible. We’ll have them do their “boot camp” prior to clerkships online, and waive the requirement for Step 1 passage to early third year. 
   
• M3s and PA2s were taken off their clinical rotations based on guidelines from the AAMC on March 17. Fortunately most had already accomplished the objectives for this six-week clerkship in 4½ weeks, so they took their end-of-clerkship exams March 27. The next rotation involves two four-week online electives in hopes that they will return to clinical experiences around June 1.
   
• Our M4s celebrated their Match results virtually online March 16 with a fine performance by the FSU main campus “players” and introduction of our seniors and their matches by each of our regional campus deans. While not as raucous as the Ruby Diamond event, students appreciated the efforts to make this a special day. Unfortunately the calendar is flying by, and it looks like we’ll have to do our commencement virtually also. More details to follow.  

     During Match, we also held our Clerkship Directors Meeting, usually here in Tallahassee, virtually. The dialogue among the clerkship and education directors, along with education leadership and regional deans, was amazing, and there was a true sense of mission to do what is best to produce the best physicians for the future. I am impressed each day with the energy, dedication and professionalism of our faculty and staff, who are responding to this national emergency in creative and impressive ways. Our challenge will be to take advantage of these great ideas once we return to “normal.”

         Our students and faculty continue to excel and make us proud.     

         Be safe and stay healthy!  J.    

John P. Fogarty, M.D.

Dean

Florida State University College of Medicine