Creating a Diverse Physician Workforce Through Training in Diversity, Bias, and Selection: An Innovative Approach to Preparing Medical Students as Future Academic Leaders

Medical students are the future of academic medicine. They will serve as admissions committee members, deans, and program directors with responsibility for selecting future physicians. At the same time, schools and programs are working to diversify the physician workforce to care for diverse patient populations. At UAB Heersink School of Medicine, we developed an elective course, Holistic Review: Creating a Mission-Driven Physician Workforce, to train learners in bias, diversity, and data-informed decision-making. Students applied lessons to the admissions process by participating in application screening and multiple-mini interview rating. Student reflections demonstrated course applicability for careers in medicine and beyond.