Faculty Spotlight: Somnath Mookherjee
Dr. Somnath Mookherjee joined the University of Washington Medical Center-Montlake hospitalist service in 2007 as an acting instructor. From 2008-2012, he was a fellow in hospital medicine and clinical assistant professor at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) before returning to the UW, where he was appointed as acting assistant professor in 2012, and subsequently promoted to assistant professor on the clinician-scholar pathway in 2013 and associate professor in 2017.
Mookherjee conducts high impact scholarly work in medical education and faculty development. He is the founding director of the Academic Hospitalist Medicine Fellowship and the UW GIM Faculty Development Program. He is the creator and co-editor of “The Handbook of Clinical Teaching,” which is regarded as a leading faculty development text for clinical teaching and has had over 46,000 chapter downloads and over 500 book sales. He has authored 6 textbooks and 26 peer-reviewed manuscripts in the realm of medical education.
Mookherjee is an exceptional teacher and mentor across the continuum of medical education, including undergraduate medical students, hospital medicine fellows, and junior faculty. He was asked to join the UW School of Medicine Colleges Faculty as a mentor in 2019 and is a founding director for both the DGIM Faculty Development Program and the UW Academic Hospital Medicine Fellowship. He is a celebrated educator.
One learner noted that “Dr. Mookherjee's enthusiasm to teach is inspirational” and another stated “He has really mastered the art of effective teaching.”
In recognition of his contributions to medical education, Mookherjee was the 2023 recipient of the Society of Hospital Medicine (SHM) Excellence in Teaching Award, which recognizes outstanding teaching prowess and mentoring to other hospitalists, residents, medical students, or other healthcare professionals, as well as the 2023 recipient of the Society of General Internal Medicine National Award for Scholarship in Medical Education.