Training and supporting future academic neurosurgeons is at the heart of our residency program. The unprecedented APP support allows for residents to learn clinical neurosurgery and be productive with their research endeavors. Our residency is centered around clinical excellence and academic productivity.  We support resident research by having Pre-residents and medical students collaborate with the residents to support the resident research efforts, while simultaneously developing the mentorship ability of the residents.  The department has a dedicated research team for the residents and has funding for statistical analysis support, traveling to present research talks. The Program Director and Chair were the first and are still some of the only published authors on how to rapidly increase academic productivity in a neurosurgery program (insert Bowers article citation here on increasing academic productivity Zafar Karimov and Bowers et al.). They have used their same published techniques here at UNM and have experienced an even greater exponential increase in academic productivity. Much of the research is done with Dr. Bowers’ Frailty and Neurosurgical Outcomes Data Science Lab.  We have department research meetings every other week and the department has dozens of medical students actively supporting the resident and pre-resident research efforts.

Under the new department leadership, and the new residency training program, medical student elective clerkships have increased exponentially in our department. The 3rd year clinical clerkship in neurosurgery has become extremely popular and we have medical students on service a majority of the time. In addition, we typically have medical students matching into neurosurgery residency every year. We also take great pride in having undergraduates, medical students from outside programs, and students from other disciplines within the health sciences observe surgeons in our department.

Our residency program follows the graduated levels of responsibility outlined by the ACGME both in terms of patient care and operative ability. During their chief year (PGY-6), residents take one day of call during each week and one weekend each month (Friday and Sunday) where they act as if they were the attending general neurosurgeon on call, working with the Chairman directly in a unique 1:1 mentorship relationship during the year. This provides an unprecedented amount of close daily mentorship by the Chair, who has previously been awarded best teacher at previous institutions.  The residency program strictly adheres to the 80-hour work week guidelines and all residents comply with this mandate. There is never pressure on the residents to violate duty hours in order to “get the work done” because the APP’s take care of the non-educational aspects of patient care, so that the residents can always sign out uncompleted tasks to the APP’s. This enables them to always leave on time. 

The residents and faculty follow the program goals and objectives and also participate in monthly resident evaluations with rotating residents on the service. Residents are evaluated each month with a “360-degree evaluation” process which allows for feedback from caregivers across the patient care spectrum as well as staff and faculty. Residents meet with the Residency Program Director semiannually, and on an as needed basis, to discuss progress and to define individual goals and objectives. They also meet semiannually with the CCC. Residents take the Neurosurgery American Board of Neurological Surgeons’ Written Exam annually, starting their intern year, and they take it for credit during their third year.