STFM FOUNDATION LAUNCHES CAMPAIGN TO SUPPORT UNDERREPRESENTED IN MEDICINE

Traci Nolte

doi:10.1370/afm.2279

The STFM Foundation has launched a 2-year fundraising campaign to raise $150,000 to support programs and scholarships for underrepresented in medicine (URM) students, residents, and new faculty. “We need a diverse and culturally competent workforce to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse patient population,” said Campaign Chair Judy Washington, MD.

The Association of American Medical Colleges defines underrepresented in medicine as: “those racial and ethnic populations that are underrepresented in the medical profession relative to their numbers in the general population.” While 1 in 8 Americans is African American, only 1 in 15 doctors is. And though 1 in 6 Americans identifies as Hispanic/Latino, only 1 in 20 doctors does. The percentages of medical school graduates by race and ethnicity have remained consistent over time. Whites (58.8%) and Asians (19.8%) continue to represent the largest cadre of medical school graduates, comprising more than three-quarters of medical students graduating in 2015. For the same year, only 5.7% of graduates were Black or African American and only 4.6% Hispanic or Latino. As family medicine resident Melissa Melendez, DO, explained, “I’m kind of alone out here in medicine.”

Donations to the URM campaign will support scholarships for students to attend the Conference on Medical Student Education, scholarships for residents to attend the Faculty for Tomorrow Workshop, and scholarships for new faculty to attend the STFM Annual Spring Conference. The STFM Foundation also seeks to provide mentoring opportunities and fund innovative projects that contribute to a diverse family medicine workforce.

“How much richer would a medical department be if they had people of lots of different backgrounds and experiences informing the residency training process, informing how we deal with patient care and how we interact with office staff?” mused Christina Johnson, MD, PhD.

To date, the fundraising effort has raised $109,427. STFM Past President Jeannette South-Paul, MD, kicked the campaign off with a $30,000 contribution. Watch the campaign video and support the campaign by visiting http://www.stfm.org/foundation.