Two department educators recognized for teaching excellence

By Nicholas Roznovsky
 

A pair of University of California, San Francisco Department of Psychiatry educators were recognized for their outstanding teaching work over the past year during the UCSF School of Medicine's 2016-2017 Teaching Awards on October 18.

David Elkin, MD, MSL, was named as one of the six inaugural recipients of the Maxine Papadakis Award for Faculty Professionalism and Respect as an exemplar in treating students and all others in the clinical environment with professionalism, courtesy and respect. An educator and clinician based at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center, has coordinated and taught many courses during his time at UCSF, including core didactics and a humanities seminar focused on professionalism and ethics. He was recognized in 2009 with the UCSF Osler Distinguished Teaching Award.

The award is named in honor of Professor Emeritus Maxine Papadakis, MD, who served as the School of Medicine's associate dean for students from 1998 to 2016. During her tenure, Papadakis devoted considerable effort to measuring and improving the professionalism and respectful behavior of faculty in the learning environment, publishing widely in this area, and receiving national recognition for her work. The award was created to celebrate faculty teachers in the core clinical rotations who significantly impact the clinical learning climate for students and advance UCSF values in education.

Emma Samelson-Jones, MD, was recognized as one of the 2017 recipients of the UCSF Kaiser Award for Excellence in Teaching in recognition of her outstanding educational efforts in an ambulatory care setting. In addition to her teaching duties, she is an attending psychiatrist in the Psychotic Experiences Clinic and the general Adult Psychiatry Clinic at UCSF Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital, and in the primary care practice of the Division of General Internal Medicine at Mt. Zion.

The Kaiser Award for Excellence in Teaching was started in 1969 with funds provided by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. They bestow significant academic distinction, as well as a small monetary award for the recipients. Faculty members who teach medical students or residents are eligible for nomination, and only medical students and residents can make nominations. In addition to Samelson-Jones, nominees this year from UCSF Psychiatry included James Bourgeois, OD, MD, and Demian Rose, MD, PhD.


About UCSF Psychiatry

The UCSF Department of Psychiatry and the Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute are among the nation's foremost resources in the fields of child, adolescent, adult, and geriatric mental health. Together they constitute one of the largest departments in the UCSF School of Medicine and the UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences, with a mission focused on research (basic, translational, clinical), teaching, patient care and public service.

UCSF Psychiatry conducts its clinical, educational and research efforts at a variety of locations in Northern California, including UCSF campuses at Parnassus Heights, Mission Bay and Laurel Heights, UCSF Medical Center, UCSF Benioff Children's Hospitals, Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center, the San Francisco VA Health Care System and UCSF Fresno.

About the UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences

The UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences, established by the extraordinary generosity of Joan and Sanford I. "Sandy" Weill, brings together world-class researchers with top-ranked physicians to solve some of the most complex challenges in the human brain.

The UCSF Weill Institute leverages UCSF’s unrivaled bench-to-bedside excellence in the neurosciences. It unites three UCSF departments—Neurology, Psychiatry, and Neurological Surgery—that are highly esteemed for both patient care and research, as well as the Neuroscience Graduate Program, a cross-disciplinary alliance of nearly 100 UCSF faculty members from 15 basic-science departments, as well as the UCSF Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases, a multidisciplinary research center focused on finding effective treatments for Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia, Parkinson’s disease, and other neurodegenerative disorders.

About UCSF

UC San Francisco (UCSF) is a leading university dedicated to promoting health worldwide through advanced biomedical research, graduate-level education in the life sciences and health professions, and excellence in patient care. It includes top-ranked graduate schools of dentistry, medicine, nursing and pharmacy; a graduate division with nationally renowned programs in basic, biomedical, translational and population sciences; and a preeminent biomedical research enterprise. It also includes UCSF Health, which comprises top-ranked hospitals – UCSF Medical Center and UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals in San Francisco and Oakland – and other partner and affiliated hospitals and healthcare providers throughout the Bay Area.