Dear Colleagues,

As we approach the holiday season, I am especially grateful for each of you – faculty, staff, and every individual who supports the department. Your unwavering dedication is noticed and appreciated. We have achieved remarkable milestones together, from groundbreaking research to exceptional patient care.

Please take time to celebrate shared accomplishments and enjoy this festive season with your loved ones. I look forward to building on our momentum and reaching new heights in 2026.

Sincerely,

Hugh S. Taylor, MD

Chair

Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences

ATTENTION PROVIDERS: Please do not order postpartum prophylactic antibiotics for patients enrolled in the PRECEDE trial, which is a Maternal-Fetal Medicine Units Network-sponsored double-blind randomized controlled trial of azithromycin or saline in unlabored C-sections. Please contact the principal investigator, Ozan Bahtiyar, MD, or program manager Lauren Perley, with questions.

Yale Medicine writers, working closely with Alla Vash-Margita, MD; Hugh Taylor, MD; and Oz Harmanli, MD, recently released two new ObGyn fact sheets (comprehensive articles that explain treatments) on Müllerian Anomalies and Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser (MRKH) Syndrome.

The bags for the 2025 Holiday Stuff-a-Stocking Drive are out and ready to be picked up. They're located in the Yale New Haven Hospital L&B staff break room on the center table, and are labeled by age range and gender (with a list of suggested items if you get stumped). The bags are due back by THIS Sunday, Nov. 23. Don't have time to shop? Venmo (@TaylorBalisciano) and the shopping will be done for you. Stockings will be handed out at the Kimberly Square tree lighting in New Haven, Dec. 7. They benefit children of the Hill South neighborhood where many of our patients live.

Four new funding opportunities are now open through Nuttall Women's Health (NWH). Awards range from $500,000 to $5,000,000 per project, with the research to be completed in 1-3 years. NWH expects to fund multiple projects within each RFP:

• Odessa (due Dec. 15): Ovarian Determinants of Sex-Specific Aging
• D3 (due Dec. 15): Drivers, Diagnostics, and Drug Development for Endometriosis
• Franklin Factor (due Dec. 15): Catalyzing Innovation in Women's Health
• XXcelerate (accepted on rolling basis; no fixed deadline): Turning Research into Impact for Women

Federal telehealth waivers have been reinstated for patients ensured by Medicare, at least through Jan. 30, 2026. Learn more from Yale School of Medicine-Yale New Haven Health lead digital health/virtual care officers.

On Monday, Dec. 1, enterprise-wide staff masking requirements will go into effect, which requires all physicians, employees, and volunteers to mask for patient interactions.

The Yale Flu and COVID Vaccine Program offers vaccinations through January to faculty, staff, and students. The flu vaccination is mandatory for all Yale School of Medicine faculty and staff in patient-facing and human research subject-facing positions, including per diem staff. Flu shots must be received by Dec. 1.

Lawrence "Larry" Wartel, MD, a past associate chief of obstetrics and gynecology at Yale New Haven Hospital, and a voluntary faculty member and clinical professor for Yale School of Medicine, passed away last month. He was 85. Read the full departmental obituary.

Donations may be made in his honor to the Peter E. Schwartz, MD, Endowment Fund at this Yale giving page: https://m.yale.edu/remembering-wartel

Mary Jane Minkin, MD, spoke about a new FDA approved menopause drug, and weighed in on the FDA removing black box warnings on hormone therapy products.

Terri Huynh, MD, MSCR; and Nancy Ringel, MD, MS, were the latest Yale ObGyn speakers to participate in the ongoing Pelvic Floor Health CME series. The next speaker will be Leslie Rickey, MD, MPH, on Dec. 15, discussing "How to Maintain Pelvic Floor Health Across the Lifespan/Longitudinal Aspects of Pelvic Health."

Alla Vash-Margita, MD (pictured center), was part of the team that brought together eight visiting physicians from Ukraine to explore the management of pain, mental health, and high-risk obstetrics in wartime conditions.

Hugh Taylor, MD, recently presented at the 13th Asian Congress on Endometriosis, held this year in Sri Lanka. His plenary lecture covered "Endometriosis as a Systemic Disease."

Ozan Bahtiyar, MD, recently spoke to HealthLeaders about the importance of having a range of services during high-risk pregnancies and how the team at Yale New Haven Children's Hospital achieves this goal.

Clare Flannery, MD, and team plan to continue Professor of Pediatrics Sonia Caprio, MD's groundbreaking work that involved hundreds of New Haven kids, who are now adults. It's all part of a comprehensive project called the Legacy Collaborative.

In case you missed it: Beth Heinz, MHA, MSW, discusses her perspectives on leadership and coaching in women's and children's health.

Aaron Lazorwitz, MD, PhD: 2-year funding from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health & Human Development, “Prospective Long-Term Study of Etonogest” $1,295,474

Molly McAdow, MD, PhD: 5-year funding from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute/NIH/DHHS, “Plasminogen Activator Inhibitor 1 (PAI1)” $3,943,556

Emre Seli, MD: 1-year funding from the Foundation for Embryonic Competence, “ATF: Investigation of the Role of Mitoch” $125,000

Hugh Taylor, MD: 5-year funding from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health & Human Development, “The Yale WRHR Career Development Center” $1,700,995