School of Medicine Convocation

Surgeon general to discuss nation’s health agenda at Commencement

Dr. David Satcher will speak at the Brown University School of Medicine Commencement Convocation Monday, May 29, at 8:45 a.m. in the First Unitarian Church. Eighty-one students will graduate.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — U.S. Surgeon General David Satcher will talk about the nation’s health agenda at the Brown University School of Medicine Commencement Convocation, Monday, May 29 at 8:45 a.m., in the First Unitarian Church, corner of Benefit and Benevolent streets. This year marks the 25^th anniversary of Brown’s first class of M.D. graduates.

Satcher will discuss Healthy People 2010, the agenda released early this year that sets out two major goals for the next decade: eliminating disparities in health based on race and ethnicities, and increasing the years and quality of life. He will emphasize the role graduating medical students play in accomplishing those goals.

The 16^th surgeon general of the United States, Satcher is only the second person in history to simultaneously hold the positions of surgeon general and assistant secretary for health. Prior to nominating Satcher to his current post, President Clinton appointed him director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and administrator of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, titles he held from 1993 to 1998.

After graduating from Morehouse College in Atlanta with a bachelor’s degree, Satcher received his medical degree and doctorate from Case Western Reserve University in 1970. He is a former Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar and Macy Faculty Fellow, and the recipient of 18 honorary degrees and numerous other honors. Among the honors are top awards from the American Medical Association, the American College of Physicians, the American Academy of Family Physicians and Ebony magazine.

Also scheduled to speak are Brown University School of Medicine faculty member Dr. Alicia Monroe and graduating medical student David Jackman.

Dr. Alicia D. Monroe

Monroe, associate professor of family medicine and associate dean of medicine for minority affairs in the Brown University School of Medicine, will deliver the faculty address. Since joining the faculty in 1989, Monroe has taught medical students and residents about doctor-patient communication, culture and health care, substance abuse, and health promotion and disease prevention. Her expertise in working with ethnically diverse populations and in the development of culturally responsive assessment and diagnostic tools led to the development of a curriculum for teaching skills for culturally responsive care to physicians in local managed health care.

David Jackman, M.D. ’00

Jackman will talk about the journey through medical school. He is graduating from Brown’s Program in Liberal Medical Education (PLME), an eight-year plan that combines undergraduate and professional studies in medicine in an eight-year continuum. Jackman received his undergraduate degree in music and will begin a residency in internal medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. He is from Jersey City, N.J.