By Josh Shepherd

The UK Department of Surgery is pleased to welcome the new class of incoming surgical residents and fellows for the 2020-21 academic year. In addition to this most welcome news, Surgery faculty and staff were also pleased to note that 14 senior medical students from the UK College of Medicine matched to several surgery programs throughout the United States, including five to the University of Kentucky.

Six of the University of Kentucky’s passionate and accomplished educators were recently surprised by student nominators and the UK Alumni Association as 2020 Great Teacher Award recipients.

Dr. Emily Cunningham is one of this year’s Great Teacher recipients.

Cunningham is an associate professor in the department of obstetrics and gynecology in the UK College of Medicine.

After a national search, Carl Lewis Backer, MD, has been named the new chief of pediatric cardiothoracic surgery at Kentucky Children’s Hospital (KCH), effective May 18. His primary appointment will be at Cincinnati Children’s, but he will be based in Lexington.

LEXINGTON, Ky. (March 19, 2020) — The Smith family was adjusting to their new life as a family of five when they got a phone call about their newest member. After only a week and a half of having their son safely in their arms, Chris and Heather Smith were told to get to UK HealthCare’s Emergency Department, as soon as possible. "We dropped everything and left 20 minutes later," said Heather Smith. The drive to Lexington was a long one - filled with fear and uncertainty - taking them more than two hours away from their home in Greenup County.

Link to Wednesday Press Conference 

Managing our elective surgeries differently

As you know, we have been actively working for the past several days with the Kentucky Hospital Association, other health care and hospital leaders in the state and our UK HealthCare clinical leadership team to be responsive to the governor's directive to cease elective procedures.