The AAMC has honored the University of Chicago Medicine health system and the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine with its 2024 Spencer Foreman Award for Outstanding Community Engagement.
This national award is given each year to an AAMC-member academic medical center or teaching hospital with major commitments to address community needs through collaboration and partnerships.
The AAMC noted programs supported by the Institute for Translational Medicine (ITM) and the Urban Health Initiative (UHI) – such as Community Grand Rounds and Graduate Medical Education (GME) Community Champions programs – as examples of the university’s deep dedication to community engagement.
Community Grand Rounds is a bi-directional educational seminar series where people from local neighborhoods choose health topics of interest and engage with physicians, researchers, and community partners to learn about those topics as well as resources they can use to improve their lives. Doriane Miller, MD, ITM Director of Health Equity Integration, launched the series nearly 15 years ago. It has served more than 5,000 participants during more than 60 sessions and scaled to serve the South Side and West Side of Chicago.
“It’s not just about educating, it’s about connecting,” said Miller, Vice-Dean, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, Biological Sciences Division, University of Chicago. “When community members have the information they need in a way that’s relevant to them, they become empowered to make decisions that improve their health and the health of their families. Community Grand Rounds creates an open, ongoing dialogue where the community feels heard and supported.”
Residents across specialties have the opportunity to collaborate with community members and address people’s health needs through the GME Community Champions Program. Vineet Arora, MD, Dean for Medical Education and ITM physician researcher, along with Sara Serritella, ITM Director of Communication and Faculty Leader of the Science Communication Concentration for the Master’s in Biomedical Sciences Program, have led special trainings for the residents on how to address misinformation, build trust, and engage and communicate with community members from diverse backgrounds.
“Receiving this award validates our efforts to ensure our programs and outreach initiatives across medical education and clinical care prioritize health equity and reflect a commitment to serve our diverse communities,” said Arora, Herbert T. Abelson Professor of Medicine. “We are inspired to further this important work with and for the community and encourage the next generation of healthcare professionals to grow as leaders and champions of health equity.”
Using Sci Comm to Build Trust & Address Misinformation
About the Institute for Translational Medicine (ITM)
The Institute for Translational Medicine (ITM) helps you live your best life by making research breakthroughs happen and getting those discoveries into the real world to improve your health as soon as possible.
The ITM is a partnership between the University of Chicago and Rush in collaboration with Advocate Aurora Health Care, Illinois Institute of Technology (Illinois Tech), Loyola University Chicago, and Endeavor Health that’s fueled by about $51 million in grants from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences at the National Institutes of Health through its Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) Program.
The ITM is part of a network of more than 50 CTSA Program-supported hubs across the country working to slash the time it takes to develop and share new treatments and health approaches. We work with you and for you to make participating in health research easy, so that together we improve health care for all.
ITM Contact: Sara Serritella, Director of ITM Communications, serritella@uchicago.edu
This project is supported by the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) that supports the Institute for Translational Medicine (ITM) through Grant Number UL1TR002389.