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The Department of Pediatrics would like to extend a warm welcome to Suzanne Gray, our newly appointed Pediatric Clerkship Coordinator. Suzanne has years of experience in corporate event coordination and communications. She will work alongside Drs. Latif, Berger and Sasser to organize schedules, activities, and evaluations of UASOM students rotating in the Department. She will also assist with coordination of international medical student rotations. Please join us in welcoming her to the team! 

Children's Hospitals' Solutions for Patient Safety (SPS), a national network of children’s hospitals committed to the highest safety and quality standards, selected Children's of Alabama as the January 2016 Hospital of the Month. To see the patient safety achievements SPS is recognizing Children's for, click here. 

Please take a moment to read the 2015 fall/winter issue of Inside Pediatrics, which highlights the excellent care provided by Children's of Alabama and the UAB Department of Pediatrics and Pediatric Surgery. 

Among the highlights are Dr. Askenazi's novel approach to dialysis in babies, the opening of the Gait and Motion Analysis Lab, Dr. Blount's treatment of epilepsy, the Undiagnosed Diseases Program, and more. 

If you have not received your printed issue, click here for a link to the electronic, flipping book version of the fall edition of Inside Pediatrics. Please feel free to share this link with any colleagues around the country. https://user-8msctv.cld.bz/Inside-Peds/Inside-Pediatrics-Winter-151

Congratulations to Terry Wall, M.D., General Pediatrics, for successfully completing the American Board of Preventive Medicine (ABPM) certifying exam. Dr. Wall is now certified as a specialist in Clinical Informatics. 

For more information on certification and the history of the subspecialty, clickhere. 

Congratulations to Jennifer Guimbellot, M.D., Pediatric Pulmonology, Justin Schwartz, M.D., Developmental-Behavioral Pediatrics, and Lauren Shipman, M.D., Pediatric Rheumatology fellow, on being accepted into the 2016 CCTS Clinical and Translational Science (CTS) Program. The CTS Training Program, as part of the Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) places UAB in an elite group of academic institutions that conduct broad-based clinical and translational research and provide educational programs for individuals starting in this type of research. The program is a six-month certificate program that includes approximately 50 hours of didactic instruction and interactive experience. 

Ten members of our Cardiovascular Intensive Care Unit (CVICU) team were in Houston, TX representing Children's of Alabama and UAB at the 11th annual meeting of the Pediatric Cardiac Intensive Care Society on Dec. 9-11. The international conference allows our team to present quality improvement initiatives, research and clinical innovations to other ICU teams from around the globe. The group included five nurses, one nurse practitioner and four physicians.

See the details about the presentations below. 

The 2015 list recognizes 391 UAB physicians, the most in Alabama, in 38 specialties listed who are among the top 5 percent of clinicians in the United States, as voted by their peers. For a link to the UAB press release, click here.  
To view the complete database of UAB physicians on the Best Doctors list, click here.

Congratulations to Smita Bhatia, M.D., M.P.H., on her election to membership in the American Pediatric Society (APS). Dr. Bhatia and other new members will be honored during the 2016 PAS meeting in Baltimore, MD, in May 2016. 

The mission of the American Pediatric Society is to advance academic pediatrics. This is accomplished through promoting pediatric research and scholarship, serving as a strong and effective advocate for academic pediatrics, recognizing and honoring achievement, and cultivating excellence, diversity, and equity in the field of pediatrics through advocacy, scholarship, education and leadership development. Congratulations to Dr. Bhatia on this distinctive honor!

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Additional congratulations are in order for Dr. Bhatia, as she was recently elected to the position of Children's Oncology Group (COG) Executive Committee Member At-Large representing the Hematology/Oncology Discipline for a term of three years. 

Tom’s of Maine rewards 52 nonprofits across the country with more than $1 million in funding through their 50 States for Good community giving program. Each nonprofit will receive $20,000 to advance important community projects such as helping families find affordable housing, providing assistance to those affected by autism and developing sustainable gardens in urban areas. Department of Pediatrics faculty,Michele Kong, M.D., and her husband Julian Maha, M.D., recognized gaps in service for children with autism and their families and cofounded Kulture City, a nonprofit organization specializing in providing direct assistance to children with special needs and their families. Kulture City has directly impacted more than 13,000 families through scholarships, art and music camps, and educational curriculums. For more information about Kulture City, visit the website.  

For a list of winners from each state click here. 

Jason Hartig, M.D., med-peds residency director, was selected as the top recipient of the 2015 Research and Innovations in Medical Education (RIME) Faculty Development UASOM Award; a program funded by an HSF-GEF grant. The main purpose of the RIME award is to promote teaching skills in medical education, foster curriculum innovation and showcase scholarship and research findings in medical education for the 21st century.