Press Releases: Southern California
November 2, 2004
Future doctors mend cultural gaps
Medical students get $30,000 in scholarships, foster cultural understanding
LOS ANGELES – Six Southern California medical students received $5,000 scholarships and engraved crystal awards as the first recipients of the new Kaiser Permanente Oliver Goldsmith, M.D. Scholarship for the Promotion and Advancement of Culturally Responsive Care.
The students, in their third year of medical school, "have already made major contributions to culturally responsive healthcare," said Southern California Permanente Medical Group (SCPMG) Medical Director Jeffrey Weisz, MD, at a recent award reception. "They are everything we want at Kaiser Permanente—they are committed to offering the best medical care and have gone above and beyond the call of duty for the community."
Among the recipients was Kim-Lien Nguyen, a UCLA internal medicine student, who said she got her "first lesson in culturally responsive healthcare" at age 7 when she witnessed horrors while escaping communist Vietnam. At a clinic, she watched a blue-eyed doctor who had saved her grandfather's life save many others. The doctor's Vietnamese was rather awkward but the message to Kim was clear: "Being a doctor is hard. You should never make assumptions about your patients. You have to learn their background, and listen carefully for their stories and gestures."
The doctor's words would gain meaning as Nguyen pursued her own medical career, and accepted various leadership and research positions. She helped found a minority health conference at UCLA, bringing together Asian-American, Latino, and African-American medical students to grapple with critical issues concerning the health and well-being of ethnic minorities. The conference has become an annual event, drawing attendees from all over the U.S.
Kameelah Phillips's cultural assumptions were tested on her first night on call in the emergency department. When she helped an 11-year-old Asian-American boy remove his gown and saw large bruises all over his body, she suspected child abuse.
However, the USC internal medicine and OB/GYN student learned that the bruising was not due to maltreatment but to the tradition of Gwa SA or "coining"—a Chinese cupping method to remove "blood poisons" or SA.
"Because of my commitment to and training in cultural competency I was able to approach this encounter with an open mind and a sensitive and respectful approach," said Phillips. In addition to various leadership activities, she facilitates lunchtime meetings at USC to discuss pressing health care issues in the African-American community.
For Alma Lopez, a UCLA family medicine student, the calling to become a physician also came when she was 7, when her father suffered a brain tumor that left him in a vegetative state. "At first, I doubted my choice to become a doctor," she said. "I never had any Latino role models that were doctors. But despite fear and doubt, my desire to become a doctor kept growing—I have always wanted to understand why and how my father got sick, and if there's any way to prevent this from happening to others."
On her way to becoming a role model herself, Lopez plans to pursue a joint degree in medicine and public health, and volunteers at health fairs for underserved communities. "As a Mexican-American woman, I believe that a medical degree comes with social responsibility," she said. "I plan to continue working with the underserved population as a physician."
Mariela Macias, from Downey, attends the USC Keck School of Medicine and understands first-hand what it means to be underserved. "I have been on the other side of not being able to afford healthcare, and of looking desperately for a physician to manage my mother's diabetes. It has taken away her vision and most of her kidney functions," she said.
By becoming a physician, Macias hopes to prevent the irreversible complications of diseases such as diabetes and other chronic illnesses, while addressing many other issues that plague underprivileged communities such as domestic violence and drug abuse. She volunteers as a mentor for school-age children and helped organize an after-school health education program.
"I continually witness the ramifications of the lack of healthcare in my community," said Luis Ontiveros, from Baldwin Park, a UCLA/Drew Medical School student of family medicine. "From small problems such as skin disorders to chronic diseases such as diabetes, it is important that my community receive convenient and adequate care. How many children have translated for a parent because the doctor did not speak Spanish?" In addition to becoming a physician, he plans to raise awareness about how cultural and language barriers impede proper care.
Benjamin Squire studies emergency medicine at UC Irvine, and said that his work as a paramedic in Oakland taught him more about cultural diversity than any classroom. There, he helped a Chinese woman who was wandering the streets—though it took him and three translators to realize that she did not speak any of the common Chinese dialects, but Chou-chou—a Southern Chinese dialect.
Also, because of frequent encounters with Latinos in Oakland, Squire signed up for a medical exchange program in Mexico, where he lived with a Mexican family. He applies the cultural and language skills he acquired there in his work today with a health education program for Latinos in Santa Ana. Squire has also helped to write a medical school curriculum on Latino health. "Just as I am at the infant stage of my medical training, I am also taking my first steps toward cultural competency," he said. "I hope to continue my training at a residency program in Southern California, where I will encounter culturally diverse patients and continue to learn from them."
In January 2004, SCPMG Medical Director Jeffrey Weisz, MD, initiated the "Scholarship for the Promotion and Advancement of Culturally Responsive Care" and dedicated it in the name of Oliver Goldsmith, MD, recently retired SCPMG Medical Director, in honor of his important contributions to diversity. While serving as Medical Director of SCPMG from 1994 to 2003, Dr. Goldsmith was chair of the Kaiser Permanente National Diversity Council and established the SCPMG Physician Diversity Advisory Committee. In addition, his leadership and support was instrumental in the development of the Culturally Responsive Care (CRC) Initiative, which emphasizes the delivery of culturally responsive care to Kaiser Permanente's diverse patient population. This initiative aims to ensure that clinicians are prepared to meet the cultural and linguistic needs of patients and that they are made aware of the epidemiologic incidence of disease among different racial, ethnic, and cultural groups.
The Oliver Goldsmith, M.D. Scholarship for the Promotion and Advancement of Culturally Responsive Care honors second- or third-year medical/osteopathic students who have demonstrated commitment to the advancement of culturally responsive care through community service, clinical volunteering, or research. Each award recipient receives $5,000 toward his or her education, participates in a mentoring program with a Kaiser Permanente clinician, and completes a four-to-six week clinical rotation at a Kaiser Permanente facility.
About Kaiser Permanente
Kaiser Permanente is America's leading integrated health plan. Founded in 1945, it is a nonprofit, group practice prepayment program with Southern California headquarters in Pasadena, California. Kaiser Permanente serves the health care needs of 3.3 million members in Southern California. Today it encompasses the nonprofit Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc., Kaiser Foundation Hospitals and their subsidiaries, and the for-profit Southern California Permanente Medical Group. Kaiser Permanente's Southern California Region includes more than 49,900 technical, administrative and clerical employees and caregivers, and more than 6,000 physicians representing all specialties. More information about Kaiser Permanente can be found at kaiserpermanente.org.
