Name: Clayton Damme, MD
Medical school you attended/year you graduated: University of Nebraska Medical Center, 2017
Residency/fellowship at UNMC: Anesthesiology
Program director: Andrea Dutoit, MD
How long is your training program and how long have you been at UNMC?
Anesthesiology residency is four years in length. I will be starting my fourth and final year of residency training July 2020, followed by a yearlong fellowship in interventional pain management.
What do you like the most about your training program?
Most of all, I am grateful for my co-residents and the camaraderie that exists here. As anesthesiology trainees, we start by facing a huge learning curve — tasked with mastering both clinical knowledge (pharmacology, physics of mechanical ventilation, physiology of the trauma patient) and also technical skills (endotracheal intubation, invasive lines, echocardiography). Our program here sets us up for success by exposing us early on to challenging cases like transplants, by providing excellent faculty-resident mentorship, and by allowing us to customize our training experience with elective rotations and the promotion of clinical research.
What challenges do you foresee in graduate medical education in the future?
We are experiencing a physician shortage as a country. At the same time, medical students are taking on increased personal debt for education. At the same time, more of these students are extending training for further sub-specialization. At the same time, physicians are facing decreased reimbursement rates. In order to continue attracting bright students to medicine and to continue to take good care of patients, we need to have a sustainable plan for the future.
List some accomplishments that you are proud of:
- Being elected chief resident;
- Designing and implementing a grant-funded clinical trial with Madhuri Are, MD; and
- Balancing the roles of resident/husband/father during residency.
Tell us three things about you that others may not know:
- I’m a first-generation college student.
- I’ve traveled to 15 countries.
- I make my own kombucha.