Education Programs Javed Butler, MD, MPH, MB nates ‘Shirley Schlesinger M VeeChale of Education sseessingenmnme es Michelle Hora, MD whermesd race S.Calvin Thigpen, MD, FACP Residency Program Dior ‘higpomeme Zeb Henson, MD, FACP Medsted rogram Oitecor shemansamesi amanda Clark, MD Kimbeely Harkins, MD, FACP Corkinesumeade Rahat Noor, MD, FACP rmooreumcess Charlta Seot-tennett, MD, FACP Amit Resi Ppim Die Lyssa Weatherly, MD. Ad estan Pega Ober Cheryl Moss. MS Ed Se minis sen Pram Monica Watkins stints Jennifer Chappel! ‘Stocet Program Administ Chief Medical Residents Jeremy Courtney, MD deourtneysumceds (C.Murphy Hinson, DO pntumceda Sarah Kerat, MD skeruteumcedu Kelly Pippin, MD Ldpippinumcedy University of Mississippi Medical Center Department of Medicine 2500 North State Street Jackson, Mississippi 39216-4505 April 3, 2019 RE: University of Mississippi Internal Medicine Residency rank order list Dear 2018-2019 Residency Applicants, am writing to review what I have discussed with many of you over the telephone at some point since Match Day 2019 and to inform those of you with whom I have not had the opportunity to | speak of the reason for my call. (On March 15, 2019, at 3:45 PM Central time, approximately three hours after the completion of our institution's Match Day ceremony and just under four hours after the completion of Match week, ‘our Program Coordinator, Ms. Cheryl Moss, unintentionally attached an Excel file of our program's final categorical medicine, primary care, and preliminary medicine rank order lists to an email she sent to the 37 students who matched into our categorical medicine, primary care, preliminary medicine, and medicine-pediatrics programs. This file included the USMLE and/or COMLEX scores of each applicant, as well as each applicant's medical school, partner name (if couples matching), and internal interview scores. No social security numbers, driver's license numbers, credit card numbers, grades, class ranks, or comments were included on the Excel file. You are receiving this letter because you were ranked on our rank order list, and your name was ‘on the document attached to the email. I sincerely apologize that your information was inadvertently shared in this manner. When this action took place, Ms. Moss had fully intended instead to attach to the email alist of those who matched with us, along with their pictures, so that the students could get to know each other before beginning residency together. Within a few minutes of the email being sent, one of our matched applicants responded to Ms. ‘Moss via email and asked her if she had intended to attach the rank order list. She certainly did not intend to do so, and she recalled the message and then sent another email to the applicants asking them to disregard the previous message and to please delete it. Within approximately one hour, the recall did pull the message back from the inboxes of those who had not opened their ‘email yet based on what some of the recipients told us later in phone conversations, However, some students did see and open the email, and others who did not match with our program were informed of the email ‘Through the night of Friday, March 15%, and the morning of Saturday, March 16%, I contacted all of the students who were recipients of the email to inform them of what had happened, to ask them not to share and to delete the email and its attachments since the aforementioned attachment contained sensitive information, and to apologize. Ms. Moss additionally contacted the same students on March 16% and 17% herself to apologize. Many of our matched applicants had either not seen the email or had already deleted it, but some had seen it and were aware of its content. From March 16® through March 31°, I personally called every individual on our categorical medicine, primary care, and preliminary medicine rank orders lists (ie, all the people whose names were on the document) to inform each of you what had happened, to apologize, and to tell you to give my cell phone number to anyone who brings up the incident so that I may talk to that, person, have spoken with 228 of the 246 ranked individuals and am sending this letter to ensure that each of you, as applicants ranked on our rank order list, have heard directly from me.University of Mississippi Medical Center Department of Medicine 2500 North State Strect Jackson, Mississippi 39216-4505 Regarding contact of external bodies potentially related to the content of the email, we have notified our school of medicine, our designated institutional officer, the NBME by telephone on. Monday, March 18; the NBOME by telephone and by email on March 19%; ERAS by phone on March 18% and by email on March 19% and the NRMP by phone and email on March 19%, We have taken steps to ensure that an incident like this does not happen again. We have begun password protection of all program documents that contain sensitive information related in any. way to the Match, making them inaccessible to anyone other than the Program Director and those authorized by the Program Director to have access. Additionally, we have developed a residency program policy with criteria for the documents that reach the level requiring password protection and are attaching that policy to this correspondence, Should you have any questions related to this event, please contact me by phone at 601-942-5829 or by email at sthigpen@umc.edu. I wish each of you the very best in your future endeavors. Sincerely, S, Calvin Thigpen>#1D, FACP Associate Professor of Medicine Program Director, Internal Medicine Residency University of Mississippi Medical Center