Editor’s note: The 14 ACS Advisory Councils, which serve as liaisons in the communication of information to and from surgical societies and the Regents, periodically submit articles on notable initiatives taking place in their respective specialties.
This week’s issue features a submission from the Advisory Council for Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery.
In June of 2013, leaders of National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD) T32-funded resident research training programs in otolaryngology met for an open discussion defining the needs of the academic otolaryngology community to assure a pipeline of well-trained, innovative otolaryngologist-investigators adequate to meet the needs of patients and training programs.
One of the most important resources discussed for new faculty navigating their early career was access to mentorship from successful clinician-scientists who could advise them through the period between starting as a faculty member and obtaining National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding. Simultaneous to these conversations, J. Gail Neely, MD, FACS, a professor of otolaryngology at Washington University in St. Louis, MO, identified a need for a national network of otolaryngologists who are NIH funded to support and mentor junior faculty. Dr. Neely, Cherie-Ann Nathan, MD, FACS (co-author of this article), and others proposed to the leadership of the Triological Society that they sponsor a network of NIH-funded otolaryngologist-scientists with the purpose of mentoring younger faculty.
The first meeting of what is now known as the Neely National Otolaryngologist-Scientist Mentorship Network occurred in January of 2014, in conjunction with the Triological Society Combined Sections Meeting. The meeting established a cohort of otolaryngologist-scientists who would mentor junior faculty through the difficulties of establishing their own research careers.
These meetings have continued annually at the Triological Society Combined Meetings and are sponsored by the Triological Society, and the attendance grew annually up until the disruption of national meetings caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. After Dr. Neely passed in 2017, a core group of ACS Fellow otolaryngologists, including Shawn Newlands, MD, PhD, FACS (co-author of this article), Jay Piccirillo, MD, FACS, Dr. Nathan, Carol Bradford, MD, FACS, and Tim Smith, MD, FACS, have run the meetings.
Now that we have emerged from the pandemic, the Neely Network and the Triological Society have recommitted to building upon the foundation laid in 2014. We recognize that an annual gathering is inadequate for providing the support that junior faculty members require and that many potential mentees are not able to attend the Triological Section meetings. The Neely Network is in the process of expanding their reach through leveraging contemporary communications platforms (such as Zoom) to share communications and monthly content between our established mentors and junior mentees. More than 90% of NIH-funded Triological Society members are mentors in the network and will participate in our mentorship offerings. In addition to monthly offerings, we are also developing a list-serve function for engaging mentees and a dedicated web page. We are working to garner grant support from the NIDCD through a recently announced R25 mechanism to help support this project.
