This summer we were fortunate to be able visit the Dell Medical School, which opened this year and is welcoming their first 50 students. However, there are still a few buildings under construction, and other administrative things that are yet to be completed. Nonetheless, judging from my experience touring the school alongside the Texas 4000 riders, the Medical School is poised to do great things and accomplish their lofty goals, one of which is transforming the way academic medicine is done. It is a breath of fresh air to hear about people trying to change the way things are done for the better, and have the aspirations of making not only communities better, but ultimately the world a better place. What stood out the most from this visit was that the people who are working tirelessly to get this Medical School up and running understand that the only way to accomplish their goals is with the help of their community, and through their collaboration. A big component of their plan to achieve some of their goals is having platforms through which they can get feedback from the community on ways certain things can be done better. With this information they plan to investigate the efficacy of these suggestions and hopefully publish and implement them if they are proven to be more efficient. With the hope that others will follow their lead. Being a researcher it is music to my ears hearing that some sort of data will be collected to prove what works and what doesn’t.
This summer I read something that resonated with me and proves useful in this context: “In god we trust, all others must have data.”
This was said by the surgeon Bernard Fisher who was instrumental in proving that the radical mastectomy was not the most efficient way of treating breast cancer. Without a doubt the visit to the medical school was an eye opening experience as was this entire summer at The University of Texas at Austin.
-Adiel Hernandez, Univ. of Miami
