Medical school is about more than studying anatomy, biology, pharmacology and other subjects. It is about learning interpersonal skills, compassion, ethics, leadership and how to care for patients as fellow human beings. Des Moines University is dedicated to teaching such skills and is a proud chapter of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation’s Gold Humanism Honor Society, which rewards student leaders for their compassion.
Students selected are between years three and four of their education and have one year of clinical clerkships under their belts. This is important because student interaction with patients, colleagues and mentors during the third year is one of the ways potential members of the Gold Humanism Honor Society (GHHS) are identified.
“It is a distinct pleasure to welcome our new inductees into the Des Moines University Chapter of the Gold Humanism Honor Society,” said Gary Hoff, D.O., faculty advisor for GHHS and associate professor of the Behavioral Medicine, Medical Humanities and Bioethics Department. “These new members have been nominated by their peers and faculty as representatives of the clinical acumen, dedication to the wider community and clear professionalism that all of us want our students to embody. As members of GHHS, these student physicians enter an elect group that will exemplify those traits for all of us, now and in the future.”
The Gold Humanism Honor Society was started in the late 1990s by the Arnold P. Gold Foundation and is designed to honor senior medical students, residents, physician-teachers and others for “demonstrated excellence in clinical care, leadership, compassion and dedication to service.” Only 92 of the more than 170 medical schools in the country have GHHS chapters. DMU became just the second osteopathic school to be granted a chapter in 2007.
“Recognition of the astonishing depth and breadth of these young people’s commitments to medicine and the community is one of the best ways to assure that the selfless efforts of these new colleagues will be emulated and continued,” Dr. Hoff said.
For more information about Des Moines University, please visit www.dmu.edu. For info about GHHS, visit www.humanism-in-medicine.org.
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