News You Can Use

(From the April 2024 issue of MedStat) 

Elaine Mardis, PhD, Named to Reuters List of 20 Trailblazing Women in Healthcare

Congratulations to Elaine Mardis, PhD, who was named to the 2024 Reuters List of 20 Trailblazing Women in Healthcare. Dr. Mardis is an internationally recognized expert in cancer genomics and immunogenomics, with more than 550 published manuscripts. Her early work contributed to the Human Genome Project, considered one of the greatest scientific feats in history. She co-led the effort to sequence and analyze the first cancer genome using massively parallel sequencing technology and was integral to large-scale cancer genomics discovery projects, including The Cancer Genome Atlas and the Pediatric Cancer Genome Project. Her ongoing research interests pursue integrated molecular characterization of pediatric and adult cancers with a focus on precision oncology. She leads an NCI-funded study that performs clinical molecular profiling of pediatric cancers, which has tested more than 2500 cases to date. Dr. Mardis serves as an advisor to international cancer centers, including the DKFZ (Germany), Institute for Molecular Medicine (Portugal), Ontario Institute for Cancer Research (Canada), and four US NCI-designated cancer centers. In 2019, Dr. Mardis was elected a Fellow of the American Association for Cancer Research and a member of the U.S. National Academy of Medicine. 

Clinical Pathway Program

A clinical pathway is defined as an institutional-specific, multidisciplinary plan of best clinical practices tailored to specific diagnoses to promote delivery of high-quality care. Within Nationwide Children's Center for Clinical Excellence, the Clinical Pathway Program (CPP) vision is to create these pathways with a goal to improve patient outcomes and decrease harm by eliminating unnecessary variation, increasing efficiency of care across all continuums, and optimizing the cost of care delivery. CPP has grown tremendously over the past three years, as there are now over 80 clinical pathways across multiple care settings.

Clinical pathways are developed by Nationwide Children's clinical experts, including physician and nursing leaders from medical subspecialties and representatives from pharmacy, respiratory therapy and other allied health practitioners. These teams review available national guidelines, evidence and expert consensus to drive standardized care. With each new pathway, the CPP team partners with internal informatics and electronic health record analyst teams to implement the recommended care through Epic tools (e.g., order sets, smart sets, best practice alerts). After implementation, CPP distributes targeted communication highlighting the new pathway. 

Pathways can be accessed directly from Epic (within pathway order sets) or CPP ANCHOR. In January, there were over 3,000 pathways viewed and accessed from ANCHOR. Most pathways are also available on our webpage.

In 2024, the CPP team has prioritized the development and revision of an additional 30 pathways, including malnutrition, psychosis, septic arthritis and sickle cell disease. If you have any questions or suggestions for a new pathway, click here to send an email.  

Physician Recognition Awards – 25^th Anniversary Celebration

Save the date – September 25

Presented from Nationwide Children’s in Stecker Auditorium

Social hour will begin at 4:30 p.m., and the program starts at 5:30 p.m.

This year will mark the 25 years of the presentation of the Career Contribution Awards. From its inception in 1999, this award has been given to a member of the medical staff of Nationwide Children’s who has made a substantial contribution over multiple years to the success of the institution’s mission, hospital operations or functions of the medical staff. This prestigious award acknowledges contributions and efforts well beyond those ordinarily encompassed in the member’s scope of professional duty.

The Medical Staff Office will also present and honor past recipients of the Golden Stethoscope Awards (Since 2004) and Bruce P. Meyer, MD, Family Art of Medicine Awards (Since 2014). Your invitation will be mailed this summer with RSVP details.

Match Day 2024

The Nationwide Children’s Pediatric Residency programs have wrapped up recruitment season and are excited to share the results of another successful match. There will be 57 new residents who will begin training in July. The new physicians come from 32 schools in 15 states and four international, including 42 Pediatric, 10 Internal Medicine-Pediatrics and five Child Neurology.