William McDade, MD, PhD is the Associate Dean for Multicultural Affairs at the University of Chicago, a member of the medical school's admissions committee and a practicing physician. His interests include addressing minority health disparities through research and education and he maintains a busy practice.
As Associate Dean, one of Dr. McDade’s goals at the University of Chicago is to increase the number of underrepresented minority students, housestaff and faculty. Dr. McDade serves as the principal investigator of three grants, which help to develop a pipeline for medical education at the university. The most recent grant, the Young Scientist Training Program, sponsored by the National Institute of Diabetes & Digestive & Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), is for minority high school students who are interested in being exposed to an early summertime research opportunity.
The Young Scientist Training Program links with the existing NIDDK summer research program on campus and attempts to show promising high school students that first rate research in the biomedical sciences is within their reach. The second grant, sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, is the Summer Medical Education Program. It is designed to enrich the backgrounds of promising college students who may not have excellent preparation for medical school and seeks to encourage them to engage in positive habits to increase their scholastic effectiveness and planning for a medical education. The final grant, sponsored by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), is a research program aimed at more advanced medical and undergraduate students, to give them exposure to the rigors of advanced investigation.
Through these and future programs Dr. McDade hopes to strengthen the confidence and abilities of a cadre of young students who potentially will become outstanding medical students and researchers. Dr. McDade believes that there are far too few minority physicians in the country, and these physicians care for a disproportionate number of minority patients. By ensuring the education of more minority individuals in medicine and medical research, the problem of inadequate health care access and lack of research in those health problems that affect minority communities can be addressed.
In addition to his work to increase the numbers of minority medical students at The University of Chicago, Dr. McDade helps to educate all the students in the ways in which culture, race, religion and ethnicity impact health care. He coordinates medical school’s Diversity Day, which is a daylong symposium presented to the entire second year class.
In the past, Dr. McDade assisted the American Medical Association (AMA) in its cultural competency efforts by serving as chair of the AMA Minority Affairs Consortium (MAC), the AMA's member advocacy group on minority health issues, and serving on an AMA cultural competency advisory committee. He has likewise been involved in the National Medical Association’s (NMA) efforts to develop a cultural competence curriculum for physicians.
His medical practice is in a hospital that serves a large number of underrepresented minority patients and his research is on sickle cell disease, a medical condition predominantly affecting African Americans.
Courtesy American Medical Association
