Abstract
In response to the need for a more diverse workforce, our medical school developed new policies and procedures that focus on the recruitment and selection of diverse students with a specific focus on those considered underrepresented in medicine. To understand what these students bring to the practice of medicine, researchers investigated their perception of their cultural assets and how they plan to use these assets as physicians. A cross-section of 23 ethnically, culturally, and geographically diverse medical students were interviewed and data were analyzed through phenomenographical methods. The results indicate that students view themselves as having multiple assets that could be of significant value in their future practice of medicine, including: a) an interest in science and access to family members in medicine, b) personal and familial struggles with health, c) self and family as immigrants, and d) strong family and community orientations. Students perceived these as cultural assets because they could directly identify where these assets could be valuable in medicine but questioned how to maintain them throughout medical school. Now that our institution has identified these assets, next steps include administrators' investigation of ways to leverage them through curricular and educational programs.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Association of American Medical Colleges. 2010. "Achieving Health Equity through Inclusion and Innovation." AAMC. Accessed December 27, 2017. https://www.aamc.org/initiatives/diversity/external/163150/marc_nivet_2010_annual_meeting_presentation.html.
Ballance, D., and D. Kornegay. 2009. "Factors that Influence Physicians to Practice in Rural Locations: A Review and Commentary." The Journal of Rural Health 25 (3): 276-281.
Bandiera, G., J. Maniate, M. Hanson, N. Woods, and B. Hodges. 2015. "Access and Selection: Canadian Perspectives on Who will be Good Doctors and How to Identify Them." Academic Medicine 90:946-952.
Benson, P., N. Leffert, P. Scales, and D. Blyth. 1998. "Beyond the "Village" Rhetoric: Creating Healthy Communities for Children and Adolescents." Applied Developmental Science 2 (3): 138-159.
Borrero, N. 2009. "English Language Learners making Connections between Home and School." Educational Leadership 66 (7): 60-61.
Carr, P., A. Pakepu, L. Szalacha, C. Caswell, and T. Inui. 2007. "'Flying Below the Radar': A Qualitative Study of Minority Experience and Management of Discrimination in Academic Medicine." Medical Education 41:601-609.
Conrad, S., A. Addams, and G. Young. 2016. "Holistic Review in Medical School Admissions and Selection: A Strategic, Mission-driven Response to Shifting Societal Needs." Academic Medicine 91 (11): 1472-1474.
Cruess, R., S. Cruess, D. Boudreau, L. Snell, and Y. Steinert. 2015. "A Schematic Representation of the Professional Identity Formation and Socialization of Medial Students and Residents: A guide for Medical Educators." Academic Medicine 90 (6):718-725.
Delgado, M. 2007. Social Work with Latinos: A Cultural Assets Paradigm. New York: Oxford University Press, Inc.
Fergus, K., B. Teale, M. Sivapragasam, O. Mesina, and E. Stergiopoulos. 2018. "Medical Students are not Blank Slates: Positionality and Curriculum Interact to Develop Professional Identity." Perspectives on Medical Education 7:5-7. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40037-017-0402-9.
Frost, H., and G. Regehr. 2013. "I AM a Doctor: Negotiating the Discourses of Standardization and Diversity in Professional Identity Construction." Academic Medicine 88 (10):1-8.
Glaser, B. G., and A. L. Strauss. 2009. The Discovery of Grounded Theory: Strategies for Qualitative Research. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers.
Guilbault, R., and J. Vinson. 2017. "Clinical Medical Education in Rural and Underserved Areas and Eventual Practice Outcomes: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis." Education for Health 30 (2): 146-155.
Israel, G., and L. Beaulieu. 2004. "Investing in Communities: Social Capital's Role in keeping Youth in School." Journal of the Community Development Society 34 (2):35 - 57. https://doi.org/10.1080/15575330409490111.
Israel, G., L. Beaulieu, and G. Hartless. 2001. "The Influence of Family and Community Social Capital on Educational Achievement." Rural Sociology 66 (1): 43-68. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1549-0831.2001.tb00054.x.
Marrast, L., L. Zallman, S. Woolhandler, D. Bor, and D. McCormick. 2014. "Minority Physicians' Role in the Care of Underserved Patients: Diversifying the Physician Workforce may be key in Addressing Health Disparities." JAMA Internal Medicine 174 (2):289-291. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamainternmed.2013.12756. .
Medical College of Georgia. 2016. "Fact Sheet: Class of 2020." Accessed December 27, 2017. http://spots.augusta.edu/smyers1/Final2020FactSheet.pdf.
Moll, L., C. Amanti, D. Neff, and N. Gonzalez. 1992. "Funds of Knowledge for Teaching: Using a Qualitative Approach to Connect Homes to Classrooms." Theory into Practice 31 (2): 132-141.
Nieto, S. 2002. Language, Culture, and Teaching: Critical Perspectives for a new Century. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.
Niu, N., Z. Syed, E. Krupat, B. Crutcher, S. Pelletier, and H. Shields. 2012. "The Impact of Cross-cultural Interactions on Medical Students' Preparedness to care for Diverse Patients." Academic Medicine 87 (11): 1530-1534.
Orom, H., T. Semalulu, and W. Underwood. 2013. "The Social and Learning Environments Experienced by Underrepresented Minority Medical Students: A Narrative Review." Academic Medicine 88 (11): 1765–1777.
Price, E., A. Gozu, D. Kern, N. Powe, G. Wand, S. Golden, and L. Cooper. 2005. "The Role of Cultural Diversity Climate in Recruitment, Promotion, and Retention of Faculty in Academic Medicine." The Journal of General Internal Medicine 20 (7): 565-571.
Razack, S., B. Hodges, Y. Steinert, and M. Maguire. 2015. "Seeing Inclusion in an Exclusive Process: Discourses of Medical School Student Selection." Medical Education 49:36-47. https://doi.org/10.1111/medu.12547.
Saha, S., G. Guiton, P. Wimmers, and L. Wilkerson. 2008. "Student Body Racial and Ethnic Composition and Diversity-related Outcomes in US Medical Schools." JAMA 300:1135-1145.
Saha, S., S. Taggart, M. Komaromy, and A. Bindman. 2000. "Do Patients Choose Physicians of their Own Race?" Health Affairs 19 (4): 76-86.
Stenfors-Hayes, T., H. Hult, and M. Dahlgren. 2013. "A Phenomenographic Approach to Research in Medical Education." Medical Education 47:261-270.
Stubbing, E., E. Helmich, and J. Cleland. 2017. "Authoring the Identity of Learner before Doctor in the Figured World of Medical School." Perspectives on Medical Education 7. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40037-017-0399-0.
Woloschuk, W., and M. Tarrant. 2004. "Do Students from Rural Backgrounds Engage in Rural Family Practice more than their Urban-raised Peers?" Medical Education 38 (3):259-261.
Wyatt, T. R., and L. Varpio. Under review. "Reading Erasure: Professional Identity Formation in Underrepresented in Medicine Students." Academic Medicine.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Ethical approval
All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.
Informed consent
Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
Conflict of interest
Tasha R. Wyatt declares that she has no conflict of interest. Sarah Egan declares that she has no conflict of interest. Cole Phillips declares that he has no conflicts of interest.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Wyatt, T.R., Egan, S.C. & Phillips, C. The Resources We Bring: The Cultural Assets of Diverse Medical Students. J Med Humanit 39, 503–514 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-018-9527-z
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-018-9527-z