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With her first post-training job already in hand, Jamie Strike, MD, is using her fellowship at the Medical College of Wisconsin and Froedtert Hospital as intensive on-the-job training for her long-term goals. Her post-training career will begin next year with a faculty position in Wisconsin. Dr. Strike, whose fellowship is in cardiothoracic imaging, is a…

As members of the ABR’s Radiation Oncology Initial Certification Advisory Committee, Drs. Michael LeCompte and Joy Ogunmuyiwa serve as intermediaries between the organization and candidates. Their voices are vital as the ABR seeks to improve the initial certification process for radiation oncologists. Their thoughts are also in demand across their specialty. Both serve their field as…

Incoming ABR Trustee Umesh Oza, MD, found his long-time employer soon after finishing his residency at Harvard Medical School. In 2005, Dr. Oza started at American Radiology Associates in Dallas. Two decades later, he’s a partner in the practice, which employs more than 100 radiologists and serves patients across Texas. He said there are several…

It’s a challenge to find subject matter experts from smaller fields who can volunteer as ABR question writers, Angoff committee members, or oral examiners. Nuclear medical physicist Jen Stickel, PhD, is an exception. She has filled all three roles for her specialty since becoming a volunteer in 2016. “It’s a small community,” she said. “It…

By Garrett Barfoot When I started my chiropractic practice focused on sports medicine and personal injury, my goal was to help athletes and patients recover. Over time, I became increasingly interested in imaging findings, a fascination I first experienced when I was the patient. Three days before my high school graduation, I was involved in…

In a full-circle moment, Kristopher W. Cummings, MD, will replace one of his mentors when he joins the ABR Board of Trustees later this month. Dr. Cummings is set to become the trustee representing cardiothoracic imaging, taking over for longtime ABR volunteer Sanjeev Bhalla, MD, whose term is expiring. Dr. Cummings completed a fellowship under…

A year ago, the two chief organizers for Communities Crushing Cancer planned an event in which eight of the 10 radiology residency programs in Massachusetts participated. Fast forward 12 months, and Somiah Almeky, MD, and Liz Lin, MD, now fourth-year radiology residents at Boston University Medical Center, are casting a wider net for the resident-led…

As planning for the new Diagnostic Radiology Oral Exam ramps up, an ABR volunteer who has dedicated his career to resident education is joining the Board of Governors (BOG). Jim Anderson, MD, who will become a BOG member at the end of the fall meeting in late September, holds multiple roles at Oregon Health &…

By Mana Moassefi, MD Does the saying “Put on your own oxygen mask first” stem from a selfish or non-moral origin? Or do we all easily grasp the vital truth that, to save another person, we must be saved first? When it comes to self-care, is it accurate to say that the well-being of a…

Erin Murphy, MD, has been affiliated with the Cleveland Clinic for most of her adult life. Dr. Murphy, a radiation oncologist, began her training there in 2005. Aside from a fellowship at St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital, her professional experience has happened at the Clinic. When Dr. Murphy became an ABR volunteer in 2020, she…

A native Californian, Jocelyn Cheng, MD, is happy to be back in her home state for her diagnostic radiology residency. To start at the University of California, San Francisco Medical Center, however, she had to rush across the country and get settled in a little less than a week. Before beginning her residency on July…

Like many of his colleagues, Brian Funaki, MD, remembers what it was like to earn ABR certification as a diagnostic radiologist in the 20th century. All roads led to Louisville’s Executive West Hotel. Now a Crowne Plaza property, the hotel was the site of in-person oral certifying exams that candidates had to pass to earn Initial…

Before he sat down to take the ABR Diagnostic Radiology Qualifying (Core) Exam in June, Ali Tejani, MD, did all the prep work. The UT Southwestern Medical Center resident put in years of study, supplemented by case-based lectures at his program, materials provided by the ABR, and other sources. He completed the ABR’s Exam Readiness…

Writing questions for ABR exams is serious work. But volunteers can still have fun in the process. Christine Eyler, MD, PhD, a radiation oncologist and member of a committee that develops questions for the Biology and Physics Qualifying Exam, said she and her colleagues find ways to keep the mood light even as they spend…

The ABR seeks input from stakeholders in various ways, including through Initial and Continuing Certification advisory committees. Volunteers on those committees help provide direction and act as liaisons between the organization and participants.  In this video, Catheryn M. Yashar, MD, an ABR Trustee and chair of the Radiation Oncology Continuing Certification Advisory Committee, explains why…