Dean's Weekly Message

November 24, 2025

Dear Colleague: 

LCME Accreditation
The University of Colorado Anschutz School of Medicine has received full accreditation for the maximum eight-year term, recognizing and ensuring that CU medical students receive the highest-quality training in classrooms and clinical settings.

The accreditation process is a rigorous review of all aspects of medical education – curriculum, training sites, support services, and leadership – to determine whether students are prepared to become practicing physicians with a commitment to lifelong learning.

The Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) notified the University last week that it is fully accredited through the 2032-33 academic year. Read more about this good news in the School of Medicine newsroom.

I am very proud of the entire team for their commitment and attention to this process. Their dedication and professionalism are tremendous examples of the work done by everyone at the School of Medicine every day.

The accreditation process involved hundreds of members of the school community since September 2022 in gathering records and preparing the documentation for the LCME’s detailed analysis. The LCME also conducted a site visit to campus in March 2025.

While there are hundreds who deserve our gratitude, I want to offer special thanks to Executive Vice Dean for Education Shanta Zimmer, MD; LCME Faculty Lead Bonnie Kaplan, MD, MA; and Project Manager Kristen Hyden, MS, for their exceptional leadership in achieving this outstanding result.

CU Medicine Annual Meeting
The CU Medicine annual meeting was last week, and our faculty practice had another amazing year!

I was proud to share these outstanding results with the members:

• Our faculty provided care for 4.74 million patient visits.
• Our practice annual revenue increased 7.5% to $1.73 billion.
• We posted a 4% operating margin.
• We achieved Vizient CPSC Billing Office ranking No. 5, the highest in our history.
• We were ranked No. 7 on the Vizient Ambulatory Quality and Accountability Performance Scorecard.

Brian Smith, MHA, Executive Director of CU Medicine and Senior Associate Dean for Administration and Finance, reported that our team is working hard to find ways to keep our faculty practice ahead of the pack. Kudos to him and the rest of the CU Medicine team for their dedication.

Vineet Chopra, MD, MSc, interim Executive Vice Dean for Clinical, Quality, and Research, provided clinical updates and those were impressive too. We exceeded our goals in scheduling appointments with new patients within 14 days. We’re maintaining a high degree of network integrity by referring to our faculty specialists, and we’ve improved quality so that our inpatient mortality index is in the top decile.

We also celebrated our exceptional child health faculty at Children’s Hospital Colorado. We have expanded health access through strategic partnerships in our targeted seven-state region. Our child health clinical productivity continued to grow, and our pediatric programs set national standards with the leading live donor liver transplant program, a No. 2 U.S. News ranking for cardiology, and exceptional PICU outcomes.

By these and many other measures, we are making the kind of progress we need to be Top 10 in 10 years. Every step matters!

Congratulations to all who have contributed to these stellar results! Let’s keep it going!

Interim Leaders for Surgery and Cancer Center
Robert McIntyre, Jr., MD, has been named interim Chair of Surgery at CU Anschutz School of Medicine, effective Jan. 1, 2026.

Dr. McIntyre has been a distinguished member of the School of Medicine faculty since 1992 when he became a senior instructor after completing surgical internship and residency at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center. He holds the Cynthia H. and John H. Schultz Chair in Surgery and serves as Division Chief and GI, Trauma, and Endocrine Surgery and as Vice Chair of Finance for the Department of Surgery. He is also Associate Chief Medical Officer for Perioperative Services at University of Colorado Hospital.

I am pleased that Dr. McIntyre has agreed to serve as our interim chair while we conduct a nationwide search to lead our outstanding Department of Surgery. With his deep knowledge of our school and hospital partners, Dr. McIntyre will provide great stability during this transition to a new leader.

James DeGregori, PhD, has been named interim Director of the CU Cancer Center, effective Jan. 1, 2026.

Dr. DeGregori, Deputy Director of the CU Cancer Center and Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics, has been an outstanding member of the School of Medicine faculty, leading impactful research studies to understand how carcinogenic conditions promote cancer evolution and to discover pathway dependencies in cancers that can be exploited therapeutically.

In July, Dr. DeGregori’s lab team, along with international collaborators, published a high-impact study in Nature showing that respiratory viral infections such as COVID trigger inflammation that can awaken dormant cancer cells in the lungs, raising the risk of lung metastasis and cancer-related death.

Dr. DeGregori is widely respected by his colleagues for his impressive work and longtime service at the School of Medicine. He is the ideal choice to lead the CU Cancer Center during our search.

Dr. McIntyre and Dr. DeGregori are taking on these roles when Richard Schulick, MD, MBA, steps down at the beginning of the year. In October, Dr. Schulick announced that he is joining the University of Rochester Medical Center in April as Chief Clinical Officer, Senior Vice President for Health System Strategy, and Vice Dean for Clinical Affairs.

CU Medicine Today Magazine
Mark Deutchman, MD, is the cover star of the fall issue of CU Medicine Today magazine, the School of Medicine’s magazine. In the article, Dr. Deutchman, Professor of Family Medicine and Associate Dean for Rural Health, describes his 20 years leading our school’s Rural Program.

Check out that feature, along with articles about new technologies to improve care for patients with Parkinson's disease, brain injury care for veterans, pediatrician Jamie Feinstein, MD, MPH’s role at the Tribeca Film Festival, and the new Female Athlete Program led by Aubrey Armento, MD.

Great original work by Managing Editor Kara Mason, photographer Melissa Santorelli, and the School of Medicine communications team! Read all about it!

CU Innovations Annual Report
Make sure you check out CU Innovations 2025 Annual Report. This year’s edition, Translating Ideas into Impact: Insights in Motion, celebrates remarkable progress that’s been made in partnership with innovators across campus, their startups, and industry collaborators. From early-stage technologies to successful ventures, CU Innovations is proud to support faculty innovators every step of the way. View the 2025 annual report online here.
 
Highlights include:

• Breakthroughs in precision medicine, data-driven drug development, and clinical trial innovation.
• Featured startups: OncoVerity, RefinedScience, Spyglass Pharma, Q32 Bio, Arrive Health, and Amplifire.
• An overview of CU Innovations’ role as the campus hub at CU Anschutz, connecting and translating emerging technologies such as AI and curated biomedical datasets through its data-ecosystem initiatives, to unify data and drive health care innovation.

 The collaborative spirit that drives innovation at CU Anschutz is impressive! Let’s keep the momentum going!

Faculty and Resident Updates
Judy Regensteiner, PhD, Distinguished Professor of Medicine and Director of the Ludeman Family Center for Women’s Health Research, and Anne Libby, PhD, Professor of Emergency Medicine, were selected to present data about the Doris Duke Fund to Retain Clinical Scientists at the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine for a two-day Symposium on Supporting Family Caregivers in STEMM held last week. Drs. Regensteiner and Libby conducted an eight-year study, funded by the Doris Duke Foundation, to help clinician-researchers remain engaged in research while navigating caregiving challenges. Throughout the grant timeline, 26 individuals were supported, and nearly all of them stayed in research.

Hirsh Elhence, MD, resident in the Department of Medicine, has been named 2026 scholar in the Stimulating Access to Research in Residency Program, funded by an award from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. He will study the mechanisms that influence protoporphyrin IX accumulation in hypoxic versus normoxic colorectal cancer cells.

Recent Publications
Jennifer K. Richer, PhD, Dean of the CU Anschutz Graduate School and Professor of Pathology, is corresponding author, and Dane T. Sessions, MD, PhD, a resident in the Pediatrics Residency Program and a former postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Richer’s lab, is first author of an article, “Androgen receptors promote oxidative phosphorylation and resistance to palmitate lipotoxicity in ER-mutant breast cancer,” published November 11 by Endocrinology. Four co-authors are from our campus.

John F. Steiner, MD, MPH, Clinical Professor of Medicine, is corresponding author of an article, “Scientific Writing in the Age of Artificial Intelligence,” published November 17 by JAMA Internal Medicine.

Cathy J. Bradley, PhD, Dean of the Colorado School of Public Health and Deputy Director of the CU Cancer Center, is corresponding author of a viewpoint article, “Unwinding Progress—Medicaid Cuts and the Future of Cancer Care,” published November 13 by JAMA Oncology.

Sarah E. Jolley, MD, Associate Professor of Medicine, is a co-author of an article, “Long COVID trajectories in the prospectively followed RECOVER-Adult US cohort,” published November 17 by Nature Communications.

Maggie A. Stanislawski, PhD, Assistant Professor of Biomedical Informatics, is corresponding author of an article, “Relationships among host genetics, gut microbiota, and asthma in US Hispanic/Latino adults,” published November 20 by Nature Communications. Six co-authors are from our campus and one is from CU Boulder.

Sean T. O’Leary, MD, MPH, Professor of Pediatrics and Investigator with the Adult & Child Center for Outcomes Research & Delivery Science, is corresponding author of an invited commentary, “Early Vaccination During a Measles Outbreak—The Need to Go Beyond Well-Child Visits,” published November 14 by JAMA Network Open.

Lauren A. Beard, MD, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, is corresponding author of an article, “Inter-center variation in non-elective removal of central catheters amongst level 4 NICUs,” published November 13 by Journal of Perinatology. Theresa R. Grover, MD, Professor of Pediatrics is a co-author.

Amit K. Reddy, MD, Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology, is corresponding author of a brief report, “Multiple sclerosis-associated uveitis successfully controlled with ofatumumab,” published November 14 by the Journal of Ophthalmic Inflammation and Infection. Six co-authors are from our campus.

Omer Mei-Dan, MD, Professor of Orthopedics and Sports Medicine Specialist at CU Sports Medicine & Performance Center in Boulder, is corresponding author of a technical note, “The Dual-Fixed Slotted Cannula for Hip Arthroscopy: Surgical Technique,” published September 27 by Arthroscopy Techniques. Five co-authors are affiliated with CU, including Jacob L. Segil, PhD, a research professor in the Paul M. Rady Department of Mechanical Engineering at CU Boulder. The work is featured in this article posted this month by the CU Boulder College of Engineering and Applied Science.

Call for Judges
Please join the MSA Course Director and Associate Directors in a day of recognition for the School of Medicine Class of 2026. Capstone presentations are the culminating scholarly projects for graduating medical students. Judges are needed to score the quality of posters and student presentations. It is only with generous faculty support that we can provide opportunities for students to explore their scholarly interests and engage in self-directed learning. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

There will be no message next Monday, December 1, due to the Thanksgiving holiday on November 27. Best wishes to everyone for a happy and bountiful holiday. Don’t forget to get your tickets to the Blossoms of Light at the Denver Botanic Gardens. CU Medicine is proud to be the presenting sponsor for this beloved holiday tradition.

Have a good week,

John H. Sampson, MD, PhD, MBA
Richard D. Krugman Endowed Chair
Vice Chancellor for Health Affairs and
Dean, University of Colorado Anschutz School of Medicine

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