It is with considerable pride and pleasure that I offer this information for those who have an interest in the Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery at the University of Washington.

This summary provides a view of our current status and demonstrates our position as one of the leadership programs in the United States.What these facts and figures do not portray are the unique collegial relationships that we are privileged to enjoy as we pursue our professional and personal lives.

Our mission statement provides a guideline for the day-to-day decisions and for long-term programmatic planning.

The missions of the Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery are to provide comprehensive care to a broad patient population, to provide consultation to the community and to the region, to train the medical students, resident physicians and graduate students, and to develop and maintain a preeminence in research in the broad area of disorders affecting the organs of communication.

The University President Mark A. Emmert, and VPMA and Dean Paul Ramsey, have provided a setting of visionary leadership and prioritization of resources. Our School of Medicine is consistently at the top echelon of NIH funding and as of 2006 we were ranked #2. The University Medical Center was named among the top 10 hospitals and our department was ranked in the top 10 in the US World and News Report survey and members of our faculty hold leadership positions in many of the specialty societies and in the AAO-HNS.

Other system-wide events have added to a very positive environment. The Cancer Care Alliance positions us as national leaders in cancer care and cancer research by bringing together the strengths of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Children's Hospital and Regional Medical Center, and the University of Washington Academic Medical Center. The University of Washington Primary Care Network now has nine well-established satellite offices and a thriving growth curve that will do much to ensure a stable patient base for education and clinical research. Our new Ambulatory Surgery Pavilion at UWMC provides an outstanding environment for growth in the high tech arena of outpatient surgery.

Our department is heavily committed to research and is regularly ranked among the leaders in our specialty in NIH support. Currently our all source research funding (direct cost) is $4,739,377.

Our departmental Outcome Research Group led by Dr. Ed Weaver has now graduated seven residents with MPH degrees and our Health Services Research Group is thriving, especially in the areas of auditory rehabilitation (The Hearing Aid Effectiveness after Aural Rehabilitation (HEAR) Trial) and sleep disorders (Nasal Obstruction & Sleep Apnea Outcomes and NRSA Sleep Apnea in Children with Craniofacial Anomalies). We are particularly pleased that seven resident graduates have gone on to successfully compete for Career Development Awards (Kathleen Sie, Dave Roberson, Shawn Newlands, Doug Girod, Paul Flint, Cliff Hume, Eduardo Mendez, and Greg Davis). The candidate pool for residency programs continues to be outstanding. Approximately 50% are AOA and/or Phi Beta Kappa; 220 applications were received for the three available positions.
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One of our major goals is to foster the development of residents and fellows in their academic careers. This goal is supported by an NIH training grant which provides one or two years of dedicated research. We have successfully built and sustained this support since its inception in 1984. Over that timeframe approximately 60% of our graduates have advanced to faculty positions around the country. Many have successfully pursued subsequent research career development awards and ultimately RO1 funding. Additionally, over this timeframe graduates of our program have assumed leadership positions including five departmental chairs: Eisele ’88 (UCSF), Esclamado ‘89 (Duke), Girod ‘91 (Kansas), McCulloch ’91 (Wisconsin), Newlands ’95 (Rochester). Additionally a number of our faculty have moved to other leadership positions including Dr. Mark Richardson, former Director of Pediatric Otolaryngology and now Dean at Oregon Health Sciences University and Dr. Bevan Yueh, former Professor of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, now Chair at the University of Minnesota.

We take our role in continuing medical education very seriously and we contribute substantially to postgraduate education in otolaryngology-head and neck surgery in the Northwest. Last year our CME courses included:

The 15 million-dollar endowment which supports the Virginia Merrill Bloedel Hearing Research Center has had a profound impact on our department. Jay Rubinstein, M.D., Ph.D. is firmly ensconced as the new Director of the Virginia Merrill Bloedel Hearing Research Center. Dr. Rubinstein has been a Visiting Professor at Samsung Medical Center, Sungkyunkwan University in Seoul, Korea; a Guest Speaker at the Second International Symposium on Advanced Technology for Recovery of Human Sensibility in Kyungpook National University in Daegu, Korea; and as Guest Professor at the University of Michigan Temporal Bone Dissection Course in Ann Arbor. This year the endowment created by Ms. Alice Wanamaker is actively funding the Allison Wanamaker Chair of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery.

Another major component of our research activity is based at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center under the leadership of Chu Chen, PhD and Eduardo Mendez, MD. This thriving program in head and neck cancer genetics has provided an outstanding environment for research training for a number of current residents.

My years of stewardship of the department have intensified a personal conviction that we are blessed with a unique environment that, in many ways, we have used to excellent advantage. We are busy analyzing our practice patterns and making vigorous efforts to become more efficient. We have made deliberate and painful decisions to eliminate some support staff positions and we are successfully competing for grants but the margin is increasingly narrow. It is clear to me that there is more to be done in the arena of endowed support. One of my personal goals is to gain additional endowments. Most particularly I would like to see endowed junior faculty research intensive positions that would support promising individuals while they establish their research careers and become competitive for Career Development and RO1 funding.

It is my privilege to work with this outstanding group of faculty, residents, and fellows. We our proud of our contribution to the advancement of our specialty.

Ernest A. Weymuller, Jr, MD
Allison T. Wanamaker Professor and Chairman

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