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University of Cincinnati College of Medicine

Medical School

Mailing Address
3230 Eden Avenue
Cincinnati, Ohio 45267
Phone
(513) 558-7333
Email address
MDadmissions@uc.edu
School Information
"The University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, located in the heart of the city just east of the university’s uptown campus, has a distinguished reputation for training prominent health care professionals and providing leading-edge research. Because of its excellence in education, patient care and research, students, researchers, physicians, and patients travel from all over the world to take advantage of its many opportunities. Established in 1819, the College of Medicine is considered the oldest medical college west of the Allegheny Mountains. It boasts an exceptional list of alumni and current and past faculty who have made considerable contributions to medicine and the medical sciences. The College of Medicine is committed to providing a curriculum that offers diverse learning opportunities. Students develop a broad range of knowledge, skills, and attitudes necessary to practice medicine. The curriculum has been carefully structured to balance subject-specific courses, integrated content blocks and clinical experiences." The school enrolls 715 medical students and 580 graduate students, and employs over 3,800 faculty, affiliated faculty, and employees. (Source: https://med.uc.edu/about/medicine) (Source: https://med.uc.edu/about/FactsandFigures/education) (Source: https://med.uc.edu/about/FactsandFigures)
General Information
The college established an Anti-Racism Task Force to "establish a new institutional culture–relationship and create educational policies and practices that are anti-racist." The task force aims to, "Incorporate required anti-racism curriculum content into all levels of education for medical students." See developments below:

Actions Taken

Admissions Policies
  • The Department of Internal Medicine's Internal Medicine Residency committed to ensuring all selection committee members "undergo implicit-bias training."
  • The medical school has a Diversity Interview Day which is a "concentrated recruitment effort that invites underrepresented minority applicants to attend a special program the day prior to their medical school interview." This program allows the applicants to interact with medical students, alumni, and faculty, as well as the leadership of the Office of Diversity and Inclusion.
  • The Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at the College of Medicine is "committed to increasing the number of qualified underrepresented minority medical students, residents, and faculty at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine."
Anti-Racism, Bias, and Diversity Training
  • The Neuroscience Graduate Program committed to the "Implementation of regular cultural competency training for all members of the NGP community."
  • The school's Internal Medicine Residency Program created the "Implicit Bias Improvement Group in 2019" which "led residency-wide town halls dedicated to challenging long standing structural racism within our institution." Subsequent efforts from this group have "led to various initiatives including the implementation of an implicit bias academic half day and a departmental health equity rounds."
  • The school's Applicant Information page states, "Our decision process is made by a diverse committee that completes a holistic review of each applicant and the qualities they will bring to our program. This committee consists of many of the people you will meet on your interview day, all of whom participate in implicit bias training on an annual basis."
Curriculum Changes and Requirements
  • The task force aims to, "Incorporate required anti-racism curriculum content into all levels of education for medical students."
  • The Department of Anesthesiology's DEI initiatives include "[g]rand round presentations throughout the entire department to address biases in medicine, health care disparities, and racism."
  • As part of its DEI initiatives, the Department of Surgery would "[u]pgrade current curricula to include DEI education."
Faculty/Staff Requirements
  • As part of its DEI initiatives and residency application processes, the Department of Surgery states, "Implicit bias training [is] mandatory for all resident application readers."
Program and Research Funding
  • The Dr. Marilyn Hughes Gaston Scholarship honors the legacy of Dr. Marilyn Hughes Gaston, a distinguished alumnus of the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. Gaston was the second African-American woman to achieve the rank of assistant surgeon general and rear admiral in the U.S. Public Health Service, and the first African-American woman to direct a Public Health Service Bureau. This fund was created for admitted traditionally-underrepresented students at the College of Medicine and who have expressed an interest in practicing in a location that traditionally has been medically underserved.
  • The Dr. Lucy Oxley Scholarship was launched in 2008 as an African American medical student scholarship at the College of Medicine. Oxley was the first African-American to earn a medical degree at the UC College of Medicine and the Oxley Scholarship is an endowment fund within the Marilyn Hughes Gaston Scholars Program.
  • The Office of Diversity and Inclusion sponsors the University of Cincinnati and Cincinnati Children’s Underrepresented in Medicine Visiting Clerkship Program, which funds 12 visiting clerkship positions from July through October for applicants from backgrounds underrepresented in medicine. This program provides a stipend up to $1500 to help defray the cost of an away rotation. Programs includes a 4-week clinical rotation in the departments of Anesthesia, Emergency Medicine, Family Medicine, General Surgery, Internal Medicine, Neurology, Ophthalmology, Orthopedic Surgery, Dermatology, Radiation Oncology, Pathology, Pediatrics, Psychiatry, Medicine-Pediatrics, and Family Medicine-Psychiatry.
  • On February 27, 2023, the University of Cincinnati Cancer Center published a research article titled "Cancer Care in the Black Community" which makes the following assertion: "Black people have the highest death rate and shortest survival of any racial/ethnic group in the United States for most cancers. An underlying source of health disparities among people of color is structural racism, which is defined as discrimination perpetuated through interconnected institutions and reinforced through culture, history, ideology, and sanctioned practices."
  • The Rheumatology Fellowship Program states as part of its Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion that it will "interview and ultimately recruit well-qualified, diverse applicants to our training programs."
Resources
  • The task force recommended Ibram X. Kendi's "How To Be An Antiracist" and Robin DiAngelo's "White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism."
  • The college has an Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
  • The Medical Science Training Program committed to "implement[ing] programs that improve education on diversity, equity, and systemic racism to empower students, faculty, and staff to recognize biases, dismantle stereotypes, and advance inclusion and cultural competency."
  • The undergraduate program in medical sciences has a "Social Justice in Medicine: Starting the Conversation" student group, which will be "engaging in meaningful discussion on issues of social justice in medicine...Topics for discussion include: social determinants of health and health disparities, historical context of racial injustice in medicine, LGBTQ+ health disparities, medical insurance and coverage, racial biases and health outcomes, and the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on health inequality."
  • The Medical Community Advocates for Representation, Equity and Social Justice group will have "Facilitated discussions of racial disparities in learning environment – Sharing Communities" and "Implicit bias training - Academic Half Day." It will also, "Evaluate bias and disparities in patient care, interactions, curriculum, and evaluations, as well as including "DEI topics in all aspects of training – Academic Half Day, Scoop, Noon report."
  • A pilot program for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion has been launched. The program has 4 modules: Why DEI Matters, Basics of Managing Unconscious Bias, Hidden Barrier to Inclusion, and Being a Diversity & Inclusion Change Agent.
  • The Coalition for Anti-Racist Action is a cross-campus network of staff and faculty committed to doing work to support calls to action by Black-led organizations at the University of Cincinnati. It works collaboratively with Black-led organizations to "illuminate and challenge policies and practices that exclude, harm, or otherwise hinder the success of Black students, alumni, staff, faculty, and community partners." It writes letters, speaks at meetings and events, participates in demonstrations, etc.
  • The medical school has a MedCARES: Medical Community Advocates for Representation, Equity, and Social Justice group, whose global aim is to "explore and address social inequities" as healthcare providers to provide optimal care to their patients, while "fostering and supporting diversity and inclusion within the residency program."
  • The Diversity First Look event at UCCOM is for new applicants and is a "unique experience designed to showcase the supportive diversity and inclusion programs offered by Cincinnati's Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion."
Symbolic Actions
  • The college established an Anti-Racism Task Force to "establish a new institutional culture–relationship and create educational policies and practices that are anti-racist. We are in a unique moment in history that can lead to meaningful and lasting change that aligns with our values to care for each other and our patients."
  • On June 3, 2020, UC News (University Cincinnati) published an article entitled "College of Medicine response to racial injustice" which issued the statement made by faculty, students and staff of the College of Medicine in response to the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery. The statement reads in part, "As a medical community working toward providing and achieving optimal health for all, it is important to recognize that these deaths were preventable and enabled by a deeply rooted system of racial inequity, oppression and discrimination in the United States."
Last updated September 17th, 2024
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