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Leadership through Scholarship

Since late 2018, Drs. Kendall M. Campbell (University of Texas Medical Branch), José E. Rodríguez (University of Utah Health), and Judy C. Washington (Overlook Family Medicine and Atlantic Health) have been working with early to mid-career faculty as they develop their portfolio of scholarship.

It began with a small $15,000 grant from the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine (STFM) to teach seven new faculty members writing and research skills. The project was unique as it was sponsored by the Minority and Multicultural Health Collaborative, and it was specifically focused on those faculty who identified as underrepresented in medicine (URM).  URM was defined as being part of one of the following groups: Black or African American, Latinx (Hispanic or Latino), American Indian or Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, or a member of the LGBTQIA+ community. The first three cohorts, as well as the faculty (Campbell, Rodríguez, and Washington) have all identified as URM by this definition.

After the first cohort, the projects were institutionalized, and STFM obtained a much larger grant from the American Board of Family Medicine to fund the project as a fellowship. Drs. Campbell, Rodríguez, and Washington were awarded the 2021 Presidents Award from STFM, and the fellowship was re-branded as the Leadership through Scholarship Fellowship (LTSF).

In reality, Leadership through Scholarship Fellowship is a two-year fellowship. The first year is full of didactics—teaching research and scholarship skills, instrumental career mentoring, and leadership education. The second year, fellows spend time as scholar mentors. The scholar mentor year is designed to allow those who recently completed the fellowship to one, mentor new fellows, and two, work with them on their individual writing projects. Even though this program is relatively new, there have been many accomplishments. To date, the fellowship has had:

    Title

    Status

    Type

    Committee experiences of early career faculty who are underrepresented in medicine (committee tax)

    Revise and resubmit

    Family Medicine

    Brief Report

    What do Underrepresented in Medicine (URiM) Junior Family Medicine Faculty Value from a Faculty Development Experience?

    Accepted

    Family Medicine

    Brief Report

    Dear White People

    Published

    Annals of Family Medicine

    Commentary

    Intentionality Required to Equip a Diverse Physician Workforce with Tools and Infrastructure to Deliver Comprehensive Care

    Published

    JABFM

    Commentary

    Abolish the Minority Woman Tax

    Published

    Journal of Women’s Health

    Editorial

    Towards a common lexicon for equity, diversity, and inclusion work in academic medicine.

    Accepted

    BMC medical education

    Original Article

    Submit it again! Overcoming the Minority Tax by learning from rejected manuscripts

    Revise and resubmit

    PRiMER

    Original article.

    Addressing and Dismantling the Legacy of Race and Racism in Academic Medicine: A Socioecological Framework

    Accepted

    JABFM

    Original Article

    An Approach to Faculty Development for Underrepresented Minorities in Medicine

    Published

    Southern Medical Journal

    Original article

    Addressing the gate blocking of minority faculty

    Published

    Journal of the National Medical Association

    Original Article

    A Call to Restructure Primary Care for the Health and Wellbeing of Future Family Medicine Trainees

    Accepted

    Family Medicine

    Letter to the editor

    Residency Diversity Data Needed to Understand Reporting of Racism/Discrimination

    Accepted

    Family Medicine

    Letter to the editor

    Start with individuals, but ensure that antiracism becomes an institutional value

    Accepted

    Family Medicine

    Letter to the editor

    Racial concordance, rather than cultural competency training, can change outcomes

    Accepted

    Family Medicine

    Letter to the editor

    Remove race from the first sentence of the presentation but recognize the effects of racism on our patients.

    Published

    American Family Physician

    Letter to the editor

    In Response to: "Systemic Racism and Health Disparities: A Statement from Editors of Family Medicine Journals"

    Published

    Family Medicine

    Letter to the Editor/p>

    Minority Physicians Are Not Protected by Their White Coats

    Published

    Family medicine

    Letter to the Editor

    In Response to Bliss et al: Academic Medicine Must Look Inward to Address Leaky Pipelines

    Published

    Family medicine

    Letter to the Editor

    Re: Use of Point-of-Care Ultrasonography in Primary Care to Redress Health Inequities

    Published

    JABFM

    Letter to the editor

    Emphasizing the Role of Nonminorities in Achieving Racial Equity in Medicine

    Published

    Southern medical journal

    Letter to the editor

    Interventions to Screen for STDs Can Also Be Used to Screen for HPV Vaccination

    Published

    PRiMER

    Letter to the Editor

    Address White Fragility In Order to Engage in Racial Caucusing

    Published

    Family Medicine

    Letter to the editor

    Strengthening Family Medicine's Role in Diversity, Inclusion, and Health Equity.

    Accepted

    Family Medicine

    Letter to the editor

    A Peculiar Trend: Family Medicine Residents of Color are Less Burned Out

    Accepted

    Family Medicine

    Letter to the Editor

    One of the first articles published by this cohort showed what participants valued in the experience:

    • A "for URM (underrepresented in medicine),  URM" approach created a safe space for junior URM faculty to discuss their experiences with navigating the field of academic medicine.
    • The minority tax and imposter syndrome were identified as barriers to scholarly productivity and career development.
    • Individual passion for clinical and scholarly topics was identified as a pathway to success in academic medicine.
     

    "This is one of the most important professional development activities I have done. It is worth the resources and funds invested and more. I wish I had this earlier in my career, but I am happy it is now available. It feels like the beginning of something special. Thanks for making this possible."

    "This experience has been remarkable, and I am very thankful to have been selected to participate in such a transformational activity. I am hopeful that bonds formed through our group will last through our participation in SFTM and lead to many collaborative activities moving forward. Our facilitators were excellent and 'real' -- they modeled behaviors and provided individual and group recommendations for strategies to help advance in our roles, departments, and careers, and I am immensely grateful for their leadership and flexibility."

    "Thank you so much for breaking many barriers and creating opportunities for us."

    "This is really the most fabulous meeting I've ever been to. It was personalized, it was very relevant to where we are in our careers, and it was comfortable. Having underrepresented in medicine mentors who can relate to our challenges and share the wisdom they have in navigating academia and learning how to become superproducers in research was invaluable."

     

    In short, the fellowship has been a resounding success.  We are excited to welcome our third cohort to the Leadership through Scholarship Fellowship and we are certain that once again we will see outstanding productivity from this cohort as well.

     


     

    Key points and participant written feedback at the end of the workshop taken from Robles J, Anim T, Wusu MH, Foster KE, Parra Y, Amaechi O, Allen KC, Rodríguez JE, Campbell KM, Tumin D, Washington J. An Approach to Faculty Development for Underrepresented Minorities in Medicine. South Med J. 2021 Sep;114(9):579-582. doi: 10.14423/SMJ.0000000000001290. PMID: 34480190; PMCID: PMC8389351.