Page 4 - Southwire Company

Scholarship IMPACT on MSM medical students

child who vowed to
become a doctor after
witnessing his uncle’s
a
A th from pancreatic
de
cancer. A girl who received a
stethoscope as a gift and wore it
around the house because she knew
she was meant to be a physician.
A teenager who, while visiting his
cousin in an intensive care unit,
walked the halls and saw too much
— children with burns, gunshot
wounds, other trauma — and knew
he wanted to help. A girl who
lost her five-year-old brother to
meningitis after doctors failed to
make the right diagnosis.
What do all of these children school with crushing debt that Stephens. “I didn’t have a Black
have in common? They all have threatens to dissuade them from male doctor until I was 23 years
grown up to become medical taking lower-paying jobs in needy old,” he says. “That has been one of
students at Morehouse School of communities. With scholarship my motivators throughout medical
Medicine in Atlanta. support, these doctors are freed school.”
For more than 45 years, to serve in primary care and MSM’s focus on health equity
Morehouse School of Medicine has underprivileged communities. has not gone unnoticed; the school
been known for educating the next As you know, the country is has twice bested all other medical
generation of physicians who will becoming more and more diverse, schools in a national study to
provide culturally competent care to but the diversity of its healthcare be named number-one for the
underserved communities. Indeed, workforce still lags, with just five institution’s dedication to the social
about 66 percent of our graduates percent of physicians identifying as mission of medical education.
are doing just that. African American. This is due, in “MSM resonates with my
“Many schools have mission part, to the high cost of completing personal convictions that health
statements that are more or less a medical degree. The impact is care is a right, not a privilege,”
the same. Morehouse School of significant, given that studies show says scholarship recipient Adonias
Medicine lives up to its mission,” that Black patients tend to have Christopher Lemma. “I did not
says scholarship recipient better outcomes when treated by enter this profession for the money.
Alexandria Williams. Black physicians. I am in it to help people.”
MSM’s MD students, who Young Black people need role Financial concerns can be
typically come from more difficult models, to show that it is possible significant for students at MSM.
socioeconomic circumstances than to pursue a career in medicine, says Though the average household
their peers, often leave medical MSM scholarship recipient Darius continued on next page