The Residency Program’s educational objectives are based on the 8th Edition of the CREOG Educational Objectives for a Core Curriculum for Residents in Obstetrics and Gynecology. These are taught and assessed in the ACGME Competency-based format:

1. To develop appropriate cognitive and technical skills that will prepare the resident to enter the general obstetrics and gynecology practice or pursue a subspecialty fellowship by providing clinical experiences in primary and preventive care of women, normal and high risk obstetrics, gynecology, gynecologic oncology, reproductive endocrinology and infertility.
2. To develop a lifetime attitude of professionalism, self-assessment, and self-education. This includes education on the importance of timely completion of medical records, accurate documentation.
3. To provide a four-year program of increasing responsibility and professional growth that culminates in a fourth, chief resident year.
4. To provide education about the psychosocial, emotional and ethical issues that challenge the obstetrician-gynecologist and advocacy for women.
5. To provide experience with the essentials of basic and clinical research that includes formulation of the idea, design, implementation, data collection, analysis and presentation. This experience is to enhance the ability to use a medical reference library, access information systems via the internet, evaluate current medical literature, and better recognize evidence-based literature in the years following residency.
6. To provide educational experience and skills to enthusiastically and effectively teach medical students, nurses and peers. Third- and fourth-year residents assume the responsibility of presenting at various conferences such as Gyn Oncology-Pathology patient-care conferences, M&M, Grand Rounds and 4th year medical student CAPSTONE skills course as part of their training allow practice and feedback on their teaching and communication skills. These experiences permit them to function effectively as teachers during the post-residency years.
7. To provide sufficient education in obstetrics and gynecology to enable the resident to become certified by the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

The goal of this OB Gyn residency training program is to produce competent physicians with a solid knowledge base and excellent clinical skills to be leaders in our field, ranging from general obstetric and gynecologic private practice to fellowship training in subspecialties, research and teaching.

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Center for Videoendoscopic Surgery Training Lab
Our Ob/Gyn training program has a nationally recognized surgical skills curriculum and simulation lab, providing an alternative to training on patients. This comprehensive surgical skills curriculum uses a combination of one-on-one surgical training in the University of Washington’s Videoendoscopic Surgery Training Lab with practice and testing on anesthetized pigs. As a national model for best practices, it is dedicated to providing a highly collaborative education and training environment in the area of minimally invasive surgery, as well as training residents, fellows, and practicing surgeons from around the world. This curriculum is moving into the next phase of development to provide exposure to uncommon clinical scenarios, such as the management of hemorrhage, shoulder dystocia, and uterine inversion in obstetrics, and to assess competency in these and other areas (See ISIS below).

Institute for Simulation and Interprofessional Studies
The primary goal of the University of Washington’s Institute for Simulation and Interprofessional Studies is to provide leadership in the use of simulation technologies to improve the quality of health care education, patient safety and outcomes. Our nationally recognized ISIS Center has placed UWMC at the “virtual” cutting edge in surgical skills and simulation. It is conveniently located on the first floor of the University of Washington Medical Center’s Surgery Pavilion.

This center received accreditation as a Level 1 Comprehensive Education Institute of the American College of Surgeons in 2006. For more details, refer to our ISIS website.

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Synopsis of Clinical Experience

The Ob/Gyn Residency Review Committee (RRC) tracks specific procedures and primary care diagnoses through the ACGME’s web-based caselog system (OPLOG). Below is a representative listing of the average number and type of cases that first through third year residents might expect to experience as primary surgeon. As you can see, our residents have the opportunity to perform many major and minor gynecologic surgeries during their first year of training.

The fourth year residents’ data is a compilation of the 2008–2009 data provided to us by the ACGME and includes their roles as both primary surgeon and supervising assistant over the four years of training. Additionally, our R4s perform an average of 175 surgeries for gynecologic malignancies and 56 urogynecologic/pelvic floor surgeries as the primary surgeon, which places their experience in the 97th and 70th percentiles in the country, respectively.

Representative GYNECOLOGY Case Experience as Surgeon Over 4 Yrs of Residency

‡Cumulative primary surgeon over all 4 years
*Our department receives funding as part of the nationally recognized Ryan Training Program to enhance abortion and family planning education and services. Residents have the option to “opt out” of providing abortion services, but are expected to participate in family planning services & counseling.

Representative OBSTETRICS Case Experience as Surgeon Over 4 Yrs of Residency

§Cumulative numbers as surgeon and teaching assistant over all 4 years

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Major Areas of Clinical Training

The table below portrays a general representation of how much time (in weeks) you may expect to spend in each major area of clinical training:

*Note that rotations are 8–9 weeks long, rather than consistently 8 weeks as illustrated.

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Rotation Schedules

The figure below portrays a representative schedule of the 2007–2008 rotations:

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Elective Research & Husky Day

One of the Residency Program’s educational objectives is to provide an opportunity for the residents to conduct original research. During the R3 and R4 years, including use of the allotted R3 elective time, residents must conduct their research, gather and analyze their data, and prepare a presentation for Husky Day, where R4s present their research to the department and Ob/Gyn community.

Taken as a whole, the research/elective experience is designed to create a pathway to foster reading and the analysis of medical literature in the years following residency.

• Click here for a sampling of sites and areas of study our residents have chosen in the past.
• Click here for a sampling of topics from recent Husky Day research presentations.
• Click here for a PDF document with information and tips on preparing your research project

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Resident Educational Activies

• Resident Retreats (all Residents, Spring and Fall)
• ABOG Exams (Chiefs)
• Surgery Labs (12 hrs/Resident total, weekly)
• Gyn Presurgery Conferences (Gyn & Urogyn Residents, weekly)
• Oncology Combined Conference and Multidisciplinary Teaching Conference
  (Gyn Onc Residents, weekly)
• Path Conference (Gyn & Gyn Onc Residents, weekly)
• Journal Club (bimonthly)
• Resident Didactics, Lectures and Conferences (weekly, Fall-Spring)
• Husky Day Project applications (R2 year)
• Husky Day Project presentations (R4 year)
• CREOG (Winter)
• NRP Training (R1s and R3s, Summer)

Other Department activities of note include:

• Grand Rounds (weekly - see Dept. website for online calendar)
• Morbidity & Mortality Conferences (weekly)
• Quality Improvement Conferences (R3s and R4s, Winter-Spring)
• Faculty Research Hour (monthly)
• Resident Evaluation Committee "Lou Letters" (semiannually)
• Faculty Meetings (monthly)
• Faculty Development Workshop (Fall)
• Teaching Rounds (daily)
• Ski Day (Residents and Education Division faculty, Winter)
• Graduation Banquet (All Residents, Fellows, Faculty & Guests, Summer)
• Graduation Awards (awards and past recipients, PDF format)

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