University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine

The School of Medicine states it is "committed to promoting diversity in its educational programs." To achieve this goal, the SOM aims to "recruit and retain" students who are "from racial and ethnic groups that are underrepresented in health-related sciences" and other disadvantaged individuals.

The Office of Admissions has a Diversity & Inclusion page. It states that the Medical School "is committed to diversity and inclusion across a broad spectrum of characteristics and issues."

In order to "develop a common understanding and commitment to valuing, achieving, and celebrating diversity and inclusion initiatives," new students are provided training at orientation.

The school offers a “MS-2: Racism in Medicine” course, where students “will come to appreciate and understand the history and structure of systemic racism; its effects on healthcare delivery, the science of medicine, and medical education; and strategies to address racism and its effects.” Students will, among other things, “Understand the history of racism in medicine, in realms of research, clinical care, and education,” “Explore the impact of racism on access to medical education and the demographics of the physician workforce,” and “Utilize our skills as physicians to mitigate the effects of structural racism in medicine.”

According to the Pitt News, there was an “anti-racism curriculum change introduced last year in Clinical Experiences — a required course for all medical students that runs from the beginning of spring semester of the first year through the fall semester of the second year. The anti-racism component was implemented for the first time in January 2020 with two mandatory lectures on health equity for all 147 medical students.”

The school has a "Social Justice Elective." It said, "The 2 or 4 week fall semester interdisciplinary Pediatrics and Pediatrics Subspecialties elective allows for dialogue-centered and immersive experience integrating social justice, antiracism and health equity."

For the MS-3 curriculum, one of the "objectives of the required clerkships" is for students to "Recognize and develop approaches to mitigate bias, social inequities, and systemic racism that undermine health and create challenges to achieving health equity at individual, organizational, and societal levels."

The school's diversity framework states that the SOM ensures "that the curriculum content considers contemporary social issues facing medicine and that it fosters inter-cultural and intracultural insight." It is done by ensuring "graduates understand health disparities in the contemporary social context of medicine" and through the Diversity Workshop, which introduces "MS1s to the diversity and inclusion concepts that will be reinforced throughout the curriculum."

The Office of Medical Education has an “Anti-Racism Curricular Guide for Faculty,” filled with “Tips and strategies for case/question-writing with respect to racial designations, as well as how to talk about race, bias, and disparities in discussions.”

The school highlighted on Facebook that a $250,000 grant was given from the Richard King Mellon Foundation in order to advance the Black Faculty Development Initiative.

The school's Office of Health Sciences, Diversity and Inclusion (OHSDEI) announced "the inauguration of its Social Justice Faculty Fellowship Program." It said, "The fellowship engages one faculty member in each of University of Pittsburgh’s health science schools (Dental, Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy and Public Health). Each fellow will be paired with a community organization in a longitudinal relationship designed to engage health sciences faculty in learning that addresses structural inequity and racism while also engaging in experiential learning opportunities centered on health-related social justice-racial equity issues. Social justice presupposes that everyone deserves equal rights and opportunity – including good health. A focus on social justice allows an expansion of the cadre of individuals teaching, researching and providing care with a lens on equity and the social determinants of health.​"

The 2022 Social Justice Fellowship Awardees worked on projects that included "an actionable vision of what health equity in pregnancy can look like" and "an innovative digital toolkit for federally qualified health centers to use as a platform to display their organization’s profile and details of their advocacy."

In September 2024, the Schools of Medicine and Social Work were awarded a $5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to "test the effectiveness of the Racial Equity Consciousness Institute (RECI), an effort aimed at addressing systemic racism." The funding will specifically go towards researching "the effectiveness of RECI training and other implicit bias trainings on diversity and retention as well as on attitudes that perpetuate systemic racism in healthcare outcomes, particularly among marginalized communities."

The school hosted “The Allies' Anti-Racist Toolkit” event.

The school hosted an “Anti-Blackness, Anti-Racism, and Pedagogy” panel discussion “to provide a broad introduction to the impact and relevance of these events at Pitt and to explore the meaning of Anti-Racist Pedagogy as a teaching paradigm. Panelists will focus on significant questions about this pedagogical approach and share their own experiences in applying, and continuing to grapple with, this important topic.”

The Office of Medical Education has a “DEI Brief Glossary of Terms” and “Guide to Health Equity Language, Narrative, and Concepts.” It also links to trainings on implicit bias and microaggressions.

The Office of Health Sciences Diversity, Equity and Inclusion offers Anti - Racism and Equity Resources, including Jason Reynolds & Ibram X. Kendi’s “Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You” and Robin DiAngelo’s “White Fragility.”

The school’s Office of Diversity Programs website publicized a CNN report on the Class of 2020’s Hippocratic Oath. The report’s title was “Medical School Class Writes Own Hippocratic Oath Acknowledging Racism, COVID-19 Deaths and the Killing of Breonna Taylor.”

The school hosts a minority faculty event series held every other month, which is sponsored by the Department of Medicine Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.

The school hosts a yearly Diversity Forum.

The school reposted the University of Pittsburgh’s Statement on Anti-Asian Racism on its Facebook page, outlining its Office for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion’s commitment towards “coordinating a community-wide and community-sourced directory of anti-racism resources.”

The school has an Office of Health Sciences Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. The school appointed a "Director, Social Justice, Racial Equity and Faculty Engagement in Health Sciences."

The Office of Health Sciences Diversity, Equity and Inclusion has several initiatives and experiences, including the "Social Justice Faculty Fellowship," "Social Justice Elective," and the "American Apartheid Series."

The Office of Health Sciences Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion supported the university's "American Apartheid series." The series "will look at issues of racial inequities and injustice through several panel discussions."

The Office of Health Sciences Diversity, Equity and Inclusion hosts "Social Justice Fellowship Monthly Seminars," which is a "monthly seminar bringing in campus and community experts for skill sharing, best practice and dialogue as a resource for achieving health equity."

The university hosted a "Health Sciences Social Justice Education Summit." The summit "seeks to serve as a space to introduce, build and engage students, trainees, staff and faculty in inclusive community-campus partnership. The Summit explores health sciences activism, conjoining a culture of health and empowerment activism through collaborative engagements."

The school's Department of Pediatrics has a "The Pediatric Hospital Medicine, Inclusion Diversity Equity and Awareness (PHM, IDEA) Council." The council aims to, "Establish a yearly series that focuses on one aspect of diversity, equity, or inclusion."

The school hosted a "Race &... Lecture Series," which "is a part of the Race and Social Determinants of Equity, Health, and Well-being Cluster Hire Initiative."

On July 20, 2023, Research Equity and Community Health (REACH) Health Equity Seminar Series featured speaker César Escobar-Viera, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. The REACH series discusses "newly published or seminal articles related to determinants of health inequities" and such topics as “ways to reduce bias" in scientific methods.

The Internal Medicine Residency Program has a chapter of the Gateway Medical Society which promotes "the healthcare and general welfare of minority and socio-economically challenged populations in Southwestern Pennsylvania."

The school has an Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and a Diversity Advisory Council.

The school announced on Facebook that it held a White Coats against Racism event in conjunction with the University of Pittsburgh on May 25, 2021, “to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the death of George Floyd and in unity against race-based hatred and violence.”