Dr. Rodríguez was awarded a small grant from the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine to teach junior underrepresented in medicine (URiM) faculty how to write for the medical literature. That grant eventually grew to become the Leadership through Scholarship Fellowship, now in its fourth year, welcoming its third class.
Last month, Dr. Melissa Montoya, a 2021-2022 fellow and faculty at the Texas Tech University Paul Foster School of Medicine, wrote a letter to the editor at PRiMER (Peer-reviewed Reports in Medical Education Research) on Human Papilloma Virus. In her letter, she reminds us that HPV is a forgotten STD, and it is associated with cervical, penile, and oral cancers. While screening for oral cancer is not recommended, it is however, recommended that all eligible patients receive the HPV vaccine, as HPV is poised to become the leading cause of oral cancer in the next decade. Like screening for STD’s at social events, HPV vaccination drives can be tied to dances or other events that attract young people to ensure that we are reaching the population that is eligible. We can also count on the collaboration of our colleagues in dentistry to help promote this work.