Name: Jennifer Griffin Miller, MD, MPH
Medical school attended: MD – University of Nebraska Medical Center, Class of 2002
MPH – University of Michigan, Class of 2011
Location of your residency/fellowship training:
UNMC, residency in obstetrics and gynecology
University of Michigan, fellowship in breast diseases
What residency/fellowship program at UNMC are you serving as program director for:
Residency in obstetrics and gynecology
Number of trainees: 16 (4 per year x 4 years)
How long have you been the program director: 6 years
What made you chose to become the program director:
I love teaching residents in all of our environments – operating rooms, outpatient clinics, and labor and delivery. Residents remind us (faculty) of our passion for our field, challenge us with thoughtful questions, and support us in providing excellent care.
Being a program director has allowed me to have an important role in shaping the direction of our residency program educationally and culturally – which translates directly into the quality of care provided by our graduates to our communities across the state and region. It also has allowed me to form relationships with some pretty amazing people!
What challenges do you foresee in graduate medical education in the future:
I think institutions providing GME are ahead of the curve in terms of quality in many respects, but it costs a lot of money to provide GME, and the margins on health care are getting smaller. Funding valuable programs will be a challenge for the future.
We also have more students to consider that want to enter GME programs, and certainly in the Ob/Gyn field we seem to have a surplus of qualified candidates who want to be trained – and we need these physicians to provide obstetrical care across our region!
There is somewhat of a mismatch between qualified medical school graduates and the number of GME positions we can provide, which is a disservice to the students. This will probably get worse before it gets better. Costs of training play a role here as well.
What are the strengths of your training program:
We train Ob/Gyns who are very well rounded with a good depth of experience surgically and with low- and high-risk obstetrics. Our graduates are the kind of physicians who can excel in low resource or rural environments practicing the full scope of our field, and those who shine in fellowships as well.
We believe in the humanistic practice of women’s health care. We teach our residents to view our patients in a way that understands their social and cultural values and circumstances.
We also challenge our residents academically. We have a strong didactic program and a lot of hands-on faculty involvement in their education.
List some accomplishments that you are proud of:
Recruiting the most amazing group of resident physicians you could ever know. This is a yearly challenge!
Strengthening resident wellness through changes to duty hours and rotations, resident-driven wellness activities like our resident retreat, and working to support a positive culture for education.
Surviving a labor and delivery renovation that required moving our resident lounge no less than four times.
Tell us three things about you that others may not know:
I am married to my high school sweetheart, who is also a physician, and we have two children. They were both born at Nebraska Medicine!
I have a dedicated Vinyasa yoga practice. I started practicing as a supplement to other activities when I was in medical school, and have practiced regularly for about six years.
I love to host events at my house for friends and family. The worst was a very sad election night party, which immediately proceeded a lengthy remodel at my house. I’ve been a little slow to recover, but am hoping to get some events on the books!
COM resident program director of the month
