Recruitment and Legislative Updates and a Successful Research Day

Dear Colleagues, 

I have largely ditched my winter jacket and can start to see the colors of spring all around me! In that vein this communication will reflect a lot of positive change in the coming weeks. 

On the leadership front, we are wrapping up semi-finalist visits for the Division Head of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism. We also had our first Allergy and Clinical Immunology Division Head candidate visit this week. Division Head candidates for the Division of Cardiology will begin their in-person site visits in mid-May, and wrap in June. Finally, I am beginning to put together the contours of our pulmonary division chief search including committee members and engagement with a national search firm. Recruitment is never easy, but we are moving smoothly throughout these searches. I want to thank all of our search committee chairs, members and participating faculty and staff for their engagement with these hires. We could not do this without you!
From the legislative perspective, both House bills proposed (HB23-1215 and HB23-1243) have been heavily revised. While the original Facility Fees Bill would have prohibited facility fees for primary care, preventive and telehealth, early signals suggest that some of these exceptions will be removed. The bill does authorize a formal study to assess the impact of facility fees, something I hope this campus (and members of our department), will help lead given our significant policy and analytical strengths. 

The Community Benefit Bill has also been revised. Minimum spending thresholds have been removed, and research, education and recruitment now do count towards benefits to the community. In addition, yearly reporting requirements to community stakeholders on how resources have been expended to serve the people of Colorado have been emphasized. These changes are a reflection of strong advocacy on the School’s part to create positive change in an uncertain situation.

Finally, it was wonderful to hold our first fully in-person, post-pandemic Research Day this week. What a celebration it was. We had close to 150 in-person attendees, almost 100 poster and abstract submissions and a day full of learning with two keynote speakers, research highlights and lightning talks. The in-person poster session was extremely lively and it was great to see everything from bench science, to medical education, health services research, quality improvement and outcomes research on full display. Special thanks to our Research Vice Chairs – Drs. Higgins, Weiser-Evans and Holguin – as well as our incredible DOM research staff who organized the day’s festivities.

With these wins, and with gratitude for each member of this department – onwards!

Vineet