It's commencement season: Medical school students around the country are donning their graduation gowns, accomplished and ready to launch into the world of healthcare. With this new crop of physicians comes a new crop of inspiration, as relevant to new graduates as it is to those who have been on healthcare's front lines for decades.
Here are eight inspiring quotes from medical school graduation ceremonies this year:
Neal Baer, MD, pediatrician, television writer and producer of ER and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, to the graduates of Boston-based Harvard Medical School: "You have so much power in your own stories to do good. Shine an antiseptic light on injustice with your stories. Take your stories and your passions and turn them into potent barbs to fight dogmatism and bigotry. Use your private stories that stir and move you and tell them any way you can. Invent new ways. Speak out. That is your mission: to improve people's lives."
Betsy Nabel, MD, cardiologist, biomedical researcher, Harvard professor, president of Boston-based Brigham Health, to the graduates of Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore: "Continue to turn your challenges into meaningful productive activity. Lead the charge to ensure that all children born today share the same prospect of good health and a long life, regardless of their ethnic heritage, financial circumstances or gender identity. Strive for excellence. Work hard to earn trust. Be kind to one another and stay humble. Work to ensure the future of the planet and the safety of its people. In other words, make our world a place where everyone can get a good night's sleep."
Robert Lefkowitz, MD, Nobel laureate, professor of biochemistry and chemistry at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., to the graduates of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston: "I don't believe that for any individual, there is only one possible best choice. In my own case, I heard a calling to two careers and know many who have reinvented themselves in a variety of roles. One of the wonderful things about a career in medicine and the other health professions is that the journey has so many possible itineraries and destinations. I would hope that none of you will ever feel hemmed in or confined by early choices."
Timothy Shriver, PhD, chairman of the board, Special Olympics, to the graduates of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City: "Graduates, you have an extraordinary gift and moment to celebrate. All I am asking you is lift us up, bring us together, restore our faith in each other. Restore our faith in the future. Restore our trust in the relationships that bind us together, more strongly than those that divide us. And remember, eyes wide open, eyes always open, because if you can see all of our wounds and if you can bring science and the spirit together, you can heal our bodies and our country too."
Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., to the graduates of University of Minnesota Medical School in Minneapolis: "As doctors, as researchers, you are the guardian angels for so many people. For those you meet and get to know, but maybe [for] some you will never meet or some [who] will not remember you. That doesn't matter because you are their angels. That is a lot on your shoulder, but I know you are up for it. You've got some pretty heavy wings yourself, so give those patients and those people that you're working for and researching for and advocating for, give them the wings to fly."
Darrell Kirch, MD, president and CEO of the Association of American Medical Colleges, to the graduates of Detroit-based Wayne State University School of Medicine: "I have memories [of patients who trusted me in medical school] that are so vivid. They're crystal clear, and there's a common theme. … [Those memories] can sustain you. When you're tired or burned out, think back on them, and think about what you have been given."
Valerie Montgomery Rice, MD, president and dean of Atlanta-based Morehouse School of Medicine, to the graduates of Rush University in Chicago: "You need only dig deep and ask yourself daily, 'What can I do to make a difference?' As medical students, health professional students, nurses, researchers, you will understand that it starts with the question.
"For me now, that question is changing every day. I ask myself, 'What can I do to diversify the physician and scientific workforce? What can I do to strengthen the pipeline from elementary school to medical school, to nursing school or to graduate school? What can I do to advance health equity?' For I know that diversity is important, not based just on gender, or your race or ethnicity, but your unique experiences, your perspectives and solutions that you bring to the table. So graduates: Don't shy away from your experiences, your challenges, your joys. Yes, they are wonderfully complicated, but they shape who you are."
Atul Gawande, MD, surgeon at Brigham and Women's, Harvard professor, staff writer at The New Yorker, to the graduates of UCLA Medical School: "Insisting that people are equally worthy of respect is an especially challenging idea today. In medicine, you see people who are troublesome in every way: the complainer, the person with the unfriendly tone, the unwitting bigot, the guy who, as they say, makes 'poor life choices.' People can be untrustworthy, even scary. … But you will also see lots of people whom you might have written off prove generous, caring, resourceful, brilliant. You don't have to like or trust everyone to believe their lives are worth preserving."
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