Diversity and Inclusion in Medicine
&
Resources for Underrepresented Applicants
Updated: 1/29/22
Underrepresented minorities surge not only in the applicant pool but in the total number of matriculated students for the class of 2025 who began med school in the summer of 2021. A total of 62,443 students applied to medical school in the summer of 2020 with plans to matriculate in August of 2021. That’s an increase of 17.8% or 9,413 applicants. Read the highlights from this AAMC article Medical School Applicants and Enrollments Hit Record Highs; Underrepresented Minorities Lead the Surge. You can also review the data yourself at the following: 2021 Fall Applicant, Matriculant, and Enrollment Data Tables.
Highlights:
Total applicants for 2021-22: 62,443 as compared to last highest number of 53,370 in 2019-20. That’s an increase of 9,413 students in one year.
Also notable is the 21.1% increase in first time medical school applicants. Normally first time applicants increase between 2-3% each year.
Applicants who self identified as Black or African American rose by 21% in the 2020-21 application cycle.
The total number of matriculated students who self identified as Black or African American went from 9.5% in 2020 to 11.3% in 2021.
Applicants who self identified as Hispanic, Latino or Spanish origin rose by 7.1% in the 2020-21 application cycle.
The total number of matriculated students who self identified as Hispanic, Latino or Spanish origin went from 12.0% in 2020 to 12.7% in 2021.
Women represented 56.8% of applicants and 55.5% of matriculants.
The senseless killing of George Floyd on May 25th, 2020 threw the US into a state of mourning not only for his life but for the countless lives taken as a result of police brutality and the effects of systemic racism in the US. This AAMC article published on June 1, 2020 written by David J. Skorton, MD, President and CEO of the AAMC (Association of American Medical Colleges) and David A. Acosta, MD, AAMC Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer for the AAMC address our collective concerns and call to action: AAMC Statement on Police Brutality and Racism in America and Their Impact on Health
“Our country must unite to combat and dismantle racism and discrimination in all its forms and denounce race-related violence, including police brutality. Enough is enough. As healers and educators of the next generation of physicians and scientists, the people of America’s medical schools and teaching hospitals bear the responsibility to ameliorate factors that negatively affect the health of our patients and communities: poverty, education, access to transportation, healthy food, and health care.”
Now more than ever, the medical community needs to diversify their workforce to mirror our varied patient population in the United States. We need to recognize the barriers that many students face in their path to becoming a doctor and create ways to help students overcome barriers and succeed. The path to become a doctor can take 12+ years so actions we take today may not be realized until 2032. At this juncture, we need to prioritize supporting the next generation of African American male physicians. The documentary Black Men in White Coats outlines significant barriers preventing black men from becoming doctors and why it is so very important as a society to have a physician workforce that represents the people it serves.
Although over the past 10 years, there have been some significant gains in diversifying the medical workforce, there is still much work to be done. Women do outnumber men in medical school today, but we still need to do more to support Hispanic, African American and Native American men and women to pursue a career in medicine. According to the AAMC Table B-3 that summarizes the total medical school enrollment by racial and ethnic characteristics (alone), only 2% of American doctors are black men, only 4% of medical residents are black (2.9% female/1.5%male) and 7% of the American medical school population is black.
All medical schools have wholeheartedly embraced diversity and inclusion as key components to help diversify their medical school communities. They have instituted institution-wide assessments and strategic planning. Many are recruiting more diverse faculty and creating “pipeline programs to increase the number of qualified applicants representing diverse backgrounds,” as explained by the AAMC in their 2019 Fostering Diversity and Inclusion document. The report points out that even with the significant efforts by the medical school community to create programs and policies to address this concern, “the numbers of Black or African American medical school applicants and American Indian or Alaska Native medical school applicants had remained relatively stagnant.” It was even noted in the document, Altering the Course: Black Males in Medicine (2015) that “the number of Black or African American male medical school applicants and matriculants had actually decreased since 1978.” Since that document was published in 2015, there have been some modest gains in the number of African American males matriculating to medical school, but there is still a long, long way to go.
Resources
Created in 2015 by 5 Black medical students, the mission of White Coats Black Doctor Foundation is to increase diversity in the medical profession with more black men and women doctors.
Black Men in White Coats is a 2021 documentary exploring the question of why there are so few black men in medicine today (only 2% of American doctors today are black male) and the barriers that still exist that prevent more from entering the profession.
Racism and Health: A Reading List from the AAMC
VOICE: Veterinarians as One Inclusive Community for Empowerment seeks “to increase awareness, respect, and sensitivity to differences among all individuals and communities in the field of veterinary medicine.”
Book list published by the AVMA (American Veterinary Medical Association)
Groups To Join, Network and Connect
Native American/Indigenous
Latino Medical Student Association (LMSA)
Latino Medical Student Association Members Share Advice for Future Physicians article (Sept 2021)
Student National Medical Association (SNMA): The Student National Medical Association (SNMA) is committed to supporting current and future underrepresented minority medical students, addressing the needs of underserved communities, and increasing the number of clinically excellent, culturally competent and socially conscious physicians.
Free mentoring: Prescribe It Forward
Summer Programs
SHPEP: “The Summer Health Professions Education Program (SHPEP) is a free summer enrichment program focused on improving access to information and resources for college students interested in the health professions.” Application cycle opens in November 2021 with a deadline of early February 2022. Check the SHPEP website for details.
Public Health Leader Fellowship Program, Summer Program at Morehouse University
University of Michigan Future Public Health Leaders Program (Michigan FPHLP)
Vanderbilt University Medical Center Program for LGBTQ Health Summer Internship Program for students interested in LGBTQ health and research.
UCLA Premed Enrichment Program (UCLA PREP) - a 4 week, non-residential program. Deadline: Feb. 28, 2022
For Non-Traditional Students
Texas Academic Fresh Start is a Texas state program aimed at ensuring that a young person who dropped out of college can go back as an adult and "start fresh." College grades and credits more than 10 years old are erased.
Black/African American
Northwestern University maintains resources for students who identify as Black or African American who are applying to graduate school in the health professions. The offer a common question list and
Medical Minority Applicant Registry (Med-MAR) for students historically underrepresented in medicine.
LGBTQ+
Northwestern University has developed substantial resources for LGBTQ+ applicants to health professions graduate school.
Vanderbilt University Medical Center Program for LGBTQ Health Summer Internship Program for students interested in LGBTQ health and research.
Anti-LGBTQIA+ Hate Speech at Texas A&M Exposes Veterinary Medicine’s Diversity Problem, June 2021, by Dr. Ingrid L. Taylor
“The situation at Texas A&M highlights a wider problem of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in veterinary medicine. For years, veterinary medicine has lagged behind other health professions in promoting DEI. The Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges’ (AAVMC) 2019-2020 Annual Data Report shows that veterinary students are still overwhelmingly white, heterosexual, and female, with 80% of students identifying as straight.”
Under-Represented Applicants
UNC School of Medicine offers a year long program called MED EXCEL (Medical Education Development Early eXperience in Clinical Education and Learning). After successful completion of the program, students are given a conditional acceptance to the school of medicine. Read this article for more specifics and contact for more details: Jeanine Simmons, Senior Executive Director, Medical Education and Alumni Development, at jeanine.simmons@med.unc.edu
Medical Minority Applicant Registry (Med-MAR) for students historically underrepresented in medicine.
DACA students
Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine takes the lead and accepts DACA students.
DACA resources for premeds, complied by the Health Professions Advising office at Princeton University
Recent Articles
U.S. Medical Schools Are Struggling to Overcome Centuries of Racism in Health Care from Time.com (Aug 29, 2022)
Medical School Applicants and Enrollments Hit Record Highs; Underrepresented Minorities Lead the Surge (Dec 8, 2021)
Racial and Ethnic Diversity at Medical Schools — Why Aren’t We There Yet? (Nov 4, 2021)
New report finds wide pay disparities for physicians by gender, race, and ethnicity, from the AAMC (October 12, 2021)
Clinical Trials Seek to Fix Their Lack of Racial Mix (August 20, 2021)
Career Moves: Ways to Bridge the Gender Gap in Medical Science (July 27, 2021)
Medical Schools Overhaul Curricula to Fight Inequities (May 25, 2021)
AMA Adopts New Policy to Increase Diversity in Physician Workforce (June 17, 2021)
Underrepresented Voices in Medicine Tell Their Stories (June 1, 2021)
Medical School Admissions — A Movable Barrier to Ending Health Care Disparities? from the New England Journal of Medicine, April 29, 2021.
Why Diversity in Medicine Matters. A great piece published by the pediatrics department at Columbia University Irving Medical Center.
Black Doctors COVID Consortium. NBC Nightly News, as well as other news outlets, highlighted the amazing work of Ala Stanford and the Black Doctors COVID Consortium in Philadelphia. Last spring, They started off as a mobile COVID testing program serving the hardest hit parts of southeastern Philadelphia and since then they have expanded to include a vaccination program. Learn their inspiring story.
JAMA Apologizes and Deletes Tweet That Questioned Racism in Medicine (March 4, 2021)
From the AP: Journal’s ‘Appalling’ Racism Podcast, Tweet Prompt Outcry (March 4, 2021)
Nation’s Physician Workforce Evolves: More women, a bit older, and toward different specialties (Feb 2, 2021)
Enrollment Up at U.S. Medical Schools. According to the 2020 medical school enrollment numbers, we have made modest gains in diversifying the first year medical school classes, but we still have a long way to go. .
A New Hippocratic Oath Asks Doctors To Fight Racial Injustice And Misinformation (November 4, 2020)
AAMC Article for November 2020, Black Men Make Up Less Than 3% of physicians. That Requires Immediate Action, Say Leaders in Academic Medicine.
Saving Black Lives During COVID-19: Vaccines Matter. “Given a history of mistreatment in research and medicine, it’s easy to see why Black communities often distrust vaccination. But the pandemic’s toll means we have to increase faith in it — and fast.” (October 13, 2020)
How Diversity Training for Health Care Workers Can Save Patients' Lives: “As medical professionals, we’ve seen firsthand the damage that conscious and unconscious racial bias does to our ability to care for those in need.” (October 7, 2020)
Bloomberg to donate $100 million to 4 historically black medical schools: Meharry Medical College, Howard University College of Medicine, Morehouse School of Medicine and Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science. (September 3, 2020)
Cultivating Empathy Through Virtual Reality: Advancing Conversations About Racism, Inequity, and Climate in Medicine (Published July 2020, Academic Medicine) “Authors describe a virtual reality module, in which participants are immersed in the world of a Black male at three different time points in his life.” (July 21, 2020)
One Doctor’s Journey to Diversify Medicine. “A former Michigan Medicine Otolaryngology resident details his work towards building a more equitable future for medicine.” (August 14, 2020)
For Doctors of Color, Microaggressions Are All Too Familiar (August 11, 2020)
MC, NMA Announce Action Collaborative on Black Men in Medicine (August 3, 2020)
Medical Schools Need To Do Much More to Protect Students of Color from Racism (July 14, 2020)
Why I Gave Up My Dream of Leading Diversity Efforts in Medicine (August 10, 2020)
Fostering Inclusion: Strategies to Promote Belonging for Women and Underrepresented Physicians (July 29, 2020)
Racism and Health from the AAMC
2021 Numbers (Students who applied in 2020 and matriculated in 2021)
In the 2021 cycle, 62,443 (up 9,413 from last year) students applied to medical school and 23,711 (up 606 from last year) were admitted (37.9% acceptance rate).
2021 Fall Applicant, Matriculant, and Enrollment Data Tables
AAMC article dated December 8, 2021: Medical school applicants and enrollments hit record highs; underrepresented minorities lead the surge
2020 Numbers (Students who applied in 2019 and matriculated in 2020)
In the 2020 cycle, 53,030 (down 341 from last year) applied to medical school and 23,105 (up 419 from last year) were admitted (43.5% acceptance rate).
2020 FACTS: Applicants and Matriculants Data
On the December 16, 2020 AAMC article, Enrollment Up at U.S. Medical Schools, the authors give a nice summary of the trends in how schools are meeting their diversity goals. Some excerpts of the article are below:
“According to the AAMC, in 2020, the total number of first-year students identifying as Black or African American, Hispanic, Latino, or of Spanish origin, and American Indian or Alaska Native increased. However, this growth was concentrated at a small number of medical schools, reflecting the important contributions historically Black colleges and universities and Hispanic-serving institutions make to the diversity of the physician workforce.”
Highlights include:
Black or African American first-year students increased by 10.5%, to 2,117 nationwide.
Black or African American students made up 9.5% of matriculants (first-year students) in 2020, up from 8.8% last year.
Black or African American men (first-year students) increased 12.2%, and total enrollment grew 6.2%.
First-year students of Hispanic, Latino, or of Spanish origin increased 8.6%, to 2,678.
American Indian or Alaska Native first-year students rose 7.8%, to 248.
“Women made up 53.4% of applicants, 53.6% of matriculants, and 51.5% of total enrollment. This is thesecond year in a row that women made up the majority of all three groups, and the proportion of women in all three categories has increased annually in recent years. Among first-year students in 2020, the number of women increased and the number of men declined, continuing a five-year trend.”
For a 2019 snapshot (the most recent statistics), read this article: Nation’s Physician Workforce Evolves: More women, a bit older, and toward different specialties (Feb 2, 2021)
2019 Numbers
In 2019, 53,371 applied to medical school and 22,686 were admitted (43% acceptance rate).
According to the AAMC’s Diversity in Medicine: Facts and Figures document from 2019, “most active physicians were White (56.2%) and male (64.1%) (Figures 18 and 19). However, among the youngest cohort of active physicians (34 years of age and younger), women outnumbered men in most racial and ethnic groups (Figures 22-25).”
Diversity in Medicine: Facts and Figures 2019