FMIGS Vision For 2025

Happy New Year! 

Thank you for the honor of serving as the 2025 FMIGS Board President. As we enter 2025, I am excited by the many opportunities ahead. First, let me start by introducing you to our amazing FMIGS Board, and of course, our incredible FMIGS Administrative Team.

FMIGS BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Executive Board

• Hye-Chun Hur, MD, MPH, President                                                    
  NYU Langone Health-Brooklyn, Brooklyn, New York
• Joseph L. Hudgens, MD, Vice President                                             
  Eastern Virginia Medical School, Norfolk, Virginia
• Sawsan As-Sanie, MD, MPH, Secretary-Treasurer                           
  University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan
• Erin T. Carey, MD, Immediate Past President                                   
  University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, North Carolina
• Linda D. Bradley MD, AAGL Medical Director                                   
  Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio
• Linda Michels, AAGL Executive Director                                            
  AAGL Headquarters, Cypress, California

Board of Directors

• Chetna Arora, MD                                                                                    
  Columbia University Medical Center, New York, NY
• Shan M. Biscette, MD, MSc, MBA                                                         
  Atrium Health, Charlotte, North Carolina
• Obianuju Sandra Madueke-Laveaux, MD, MPH                               
  University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois
• Susan C. Tsai, MD
  Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois
• Shivani Parikh, MD, Fellow Representative                                        
  University of Louisville, Louisville, Kentucky
• Lara F. Harvey, MD, MPH, Program Director Representative        
  Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee

FMIGS ADMIN TEAM

• Arcy Dominguez, FMIGS Program Manager
• Arshpreet Kaur Tiwana, MPH, FMIGS Coordinator
• Roman Bojorquez, Director of Operations

As I reflect on our FMIGS vision for 2025, I would love to embody positivity, ambition, creativity, inclusivity, and transparency (PACIT) as our FMIGS motto. Because we want to include fellows in as many endeavors as possible, we made an intentional effort to identify and add fellow participants to committees and working groups in this upcoming year. We also want to keep thinking outside the box. Instead of just doing things the same way because ‘that’s how it’s always done,’ we want to take a step back and ask, ‘is that the best way to do it?’ This mindset led us to transition to the ACGME case log system, which required creativity and ambition. Since our current CPT coding does not recognize the breadth and depth of what we do as a specialty, we decided to establish manmade codes through the ACGME case log system to start capturing previously uncoded procedures. We established new codes for specimen extraction of large tumors required for minimally invasive myomectomies, created codes to identify case complexity for minimally invasive hysterectomies including cases that require extensive lysis of adhesions or large specimen weight (> 500g , > 1000g), and made codes for hysteroscopic myomectomy of FIGO 2 or FIGO 3 myomas, plus much more. Although we are still going through the pains of adopting a more comprehensive logging system with ongoing improvements, we can already appreciate the benefits of this change. Being able to label and quantify the procedures we do has been impactful. Last, but not least, the FMIGS Board and internal task force remains in conversation with ABOG to see if we might become an ACGME certified fellowship. 2025 will play a critical role in this endeavor.

As you can see, there are a lot of opportunities and much work to be done in 2025. Like most things in life, working on things you feel passionate about does not feel like work at all. This has been my experience working with the talented team on the FMIGS Board. Thank you for entrusting me and the entire board to serve our FMIGS community. We look forward to making a meaningful impact this year.