PCOM Community Celebrates Hispanic Heritage Month

October 20, 2022

From September 15, 2022 - October 15, 2022, the PCOM community came together to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month. Since 1968, this national event has celebrated the history, culture and contribution of Hispanic and Latinx Americans from Mexico, the Caribbean, Central America and South America. This year’s events were hosted by the PCOM chapter of the Latino Medical Student Association (LMSA).

“This year, LMSA has hosted a plethora of events for Hispanic Heritage Month, and I am so proud of our LMSA Executive Board for planning and executing these events,” shared Ángela Ellis (DO `25), President of the PCOM chapter of LMSA. “From our ‘Dance with LMSA!’ event, which invited students to come and learn traditional Hispanic dances like salsa and bachata, to our ‘Eat Around Latin America!’ event, which featured food offerings from across Latin America and Spain, we saw great attendance and requests to do these events again,” said Ellis. “We also hosted a variety of speakers, including Dr. Mariana Solari, a breast cancer radiologist from Argentina who spoke about her journey to medicine, from her medical training in Latin America to her residency in the United States, and the barriers she faced as a female immigrant,” continued Ellis.

“Hispanic Heritage Month is a celebration of our culture and our values,” said Junior Alvarado-Rosario (DO `25), vice president of the PCOM LMSA chapter. “One of the ways families in Latinx cultures connect is through music and dancing, and it has been very meaningful to share that connection with students at PCOM. Also, this month highlights the sacrifices our families have made for us to be here today. For some, that includes leaving their home country. As a first-generation student, this month is a reminder of those sacrifices and the importance of remembering and celebrating our culture,” continued Alvarado-Rosario.

This year’s celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month was particularly important for PCOM’s future physicians as October 1, 2022, was the first annual celebration of National Latina/Latino Physician Day. This holiday was created by a group of Latino and Latina physicians to raise awareness of the need for more Latino and Latina doctors.

“Latinx physicians make up less than six percent of physicians in the United States. Spanish is the second most common language in the U.S., and with the Hispanic and Latinx populations growing rapidly, it is critically important that there are physicians who can meet the needs, and understand the backgrounds of these populations,” shared Ellis.

“We want to represent as much of Latin America as possible and showcase the unique history of these many cultures,” shared Gabriela Campusano (DO `25), community service chair of the PCOM LMSA chapter. “Understanding and embracing these cultures will serve us as we go on to work with patients from these backgrounds,” continued Campusano.

This year’s events included:

• Eat Around Latin America!
  • This event was co-hosted by the PCOM’s Nutrition Club, which shared additional information about the ingredients used in the recipes.
• Dance With LMSA!
• Cafecitos y Casos with Eleonora Savio Galimberti, MD, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Bio-Medical Sciences
• A Guest Lecture with Pediatric Oncologist Jenny Ruiz, MD
  
  • Dr. Ruiz works with the National Hispanic Medical Association (NHMA) and mentors the PCOM chapter of LMSA. NHMA is a non-profit association representing 50,000 licensed Hispanic physicians in the United States. It is dedicated to empowering Hispanic physicians to eliminate health disparities and improve the health of Hispanics.
  • The PCOM Oncology Club and PCOM Pediatrics Club co-hosted this event.
• A Guest Lecture with Dr. Solari focused on Breast Cancer and Breast Health
  • Dr. Solari is also the mother of PCOM student Carlos Font (MS/Biomed `23). Dr. Solari is a diagnostic radiologist working in Chicago who specializes in breast cancer. She received her medical school training from Universidad Nacional de Rosario Facultad de Ciencias Medicas in Argentina and did her residency training at Loyola University Medical Center in Chicago. She did her fellowship in breast imaging at McGaw Medical Center of Northwestern University. She currently works at Rush breast imaging in Chicago.
  • PCOM AMWA Club co-hosted this event.

Looking ahead, PCOM’s LMSA chapter plans to continue hosting events celebrating the culture and history of Hispanic and Latinx culture. One such event, the Medical Spanish Workshop, scheduled to have its second session in the coming months, will focus on equipping medical students with basic medical Spanish to better communicate with future Spanish-speaking patients.

As shared on the LMSA website, “LMSA and its antecedent organizations were created to increase the number of Latina/o/x, Hispanic, or of Spanish Origin + (LHS+) individuals in medicine; to provide them and their peers with the educational resources and programming necessary to promote their success, and to increase access to excellent and culturally relevant healthcare for what is now the largest non-white ethnic group in the United States. LMSA’s conferences address these objectives by exposing attendees to critical issues affecting healthcare and medical education and by providing attendees with opportunities to further develop as physicians, leaders, and advocates for the patients they serve.”

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