Visiting Clinical Associate Professor William Simmons MD assumed the role of President of the Gateway Medical Society (GMS) on January 1, 2012. Both Dr. Simmons and the GMS have pioneered numerous efforts to improve the numbers of minorities in the medical field.
Dr. Simmons also co-chairs the UPMC/University of Pittsburgh Physician Inclusion Council Recruitment Committee and chairs the Department of Anesthesiology’s Diversity Advisory Committee.
Both the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and the Pittsburgh Courier (PDF, 11.9MB) recently published articles featuring Dr. Simmons as well as GMS’s Journey to Medicine Program. Journey to Medicine is a precollege academic mentorship program intended to increase the number of minority males on the path toward careers in medicine. The program was started with recognition that the only real hope of correcting African American males’ disproportionately low representation in healthcare, low graduation rate, disproportionate suspensions, and high rate of placement into special education, they would have to reach these students far sooner in the academic pipeline. GMS created the long term Journey to Medicine program for African American males in grade six and up.
The Pittsburgh Courier and the Pittsburgh Tribune Review also published articles on GMS and Journey to Medicine in December 2011.