SPOTLIGHT
PARTNER
Bloomberg Philanthropies A child who vowed to become a doctor after witnessing his uncle’s death from pancreatic cancer. A girl who received a stethoscope as a gift and wore it around the house because she knew she was meant to be a physician. A teenager who, while visiting his cousin in an intensive care unit, walked the halls and saw too much — children with burns, gunshot wounds, other trauma — and knew he wanted to help. A girl who lost her five-year-old brother to meningitis after doctors failed to make the right diagnosis.
All of these children have grown up to become medical students at Morehouse School of Medicine. And all of them are now recipients of scholarships as part of Bloomberg Philanthropies’ $100-million gift to the nation’s historically Black medical schools. MSM’s Black M.D. students, who typically come from more difficult socioeconomic circumstances than their peers, tend to leave medical school with debt that can dissuade them from taking lower-paying jobs in needy communities. With the recent gift of $26.3 million from Bloomberg Philanthropies to MSM via the Greenwood Initiative, these doctors will be freed up to serve in primary care and underprivileged communities — and bring care to an estimated 44,800 patients over the course of their careers. The country is becoming more and more diverse, but the diversity of its healthcare workforce still lags, with just five percent of physicians identifying as African American. This is due, in part, to the high cost of completing a medical degree. The impact is significant, given that studies show that Black patients tend to have better outcomes when treated by Black physicians. “It is important to address this shortage because Black people are dying at a greater rate than any other racial group,” says MSM scholarship recipient Ngafla Bakayoko. “If we are to grow a community of Black doctors
who know the obstacles their communities face, we will be able to address this.” Young Black people need role models to show that it is possible to pursue a career in medicine, says MSM scholarship recipient Darius Stephens. “I didn’t have a Black male doctor until I was 23 years old,” he says. “That has been one of my motivators throughout medical school.” Financial concerns can be significant for students at MSM. Though the average household income of students entering medical schools is $175,000, MSM students tend to come from households with an average income of $70,000. And while tuition at MSM is slightly lower than the average, the average debt load for a graduating MSM student exceeds the national average. “I have definitely had concerns about being able to pay off student loans,” Stephens says. “While I recognize that this path is not one for those seeking financial gain, I still didn’t want to live with the burden of an insurmountable debt.” The gift from Bloomberg Philanthropies “will allow some of the burden to be taken away,” says recipient Sonya F. Randolph. “Now I can follow whichever path I would like to, and not base my specialty on how much I will make.”
Morehouse School of Medicine
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