Chicago-based CommonSpirit Health and Atlanta-based Morehouse School of Medicine — a historically Black institution — have joined forces with the intent of improving health equity by training diverse clinicians.
The partners chose seven sites nationwide, including Seattle-based Virginia Mason Medical Center, to host three Morehouse students for rotationals each month, according to an Aug. 24 news release from Tacoma, Wash.-based Virginia Mason Franciscan Health. Other sites in the effort include CHI Memorial Hospital in Chattanooga, Tenn., and St. Joseph Hospital in Lexington, Ky., according to a Nov. 30 news release from CommonSpirit Health.
"Patients have improved outcomes when treated by clinicians of similar backgrounds who share lived experiences," Erica Sutton, MD, Morehouse's associate dean of academic programs and affiliations for undergraduate medical education, said in the Virginia Mason release.
The majority of Black physicians in the U.S. trained at Morehouse School of Medicine and three other historically Black medical schools, according to the Virginia Mason release.