Diversity Statement
We are honored to serve a diverse group of patients in our emergency departments. We also respect the experiences, opinions, values, religions and backgrounds of our team members and strive to celebrate the differences that make us a more effective health care team. Our goal is to provide excellent health care to all patients without discrimination. We achieve this goal through education, mentorship and recruitment. We are committed, life-long learners. Continually educating ourselves and our learners in how to combat bias and to provide culturally humble care. We strongly believe in creating an inclusive workspace that transcends differences and in recruiting physicians who contribute to our mission and values.
What are We Doing Now
We are focused on advancing knowledge about combatting personal biases by learning how to provide culturally humble care. In the past academic year, we have held quarterly educational sessions dedicated to a variety of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) topics. These sessions included:
- September 21, 2022, Creating a Culture of Inclusive Excellence – A lecture presentation to the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix Faculty by Inclusive Excellence champions Drs. Cammy Bellis and Dean Lucio.
- May 10, 2023, Abortion rights for physicians – Lecture given by Dr. Koyama, pediatric emergency medicine physician, who is passionate about women’s reproductive health.
- July 26, 2023, Care of a Transgender patient – Lecture given by Dr. Vempati who is passionate about DEI and is an inclusive excellence champion.
- November 1, 2023, Trauma Informed care – Workshop lead by our OB/GYN team. It focused on how to provide care to patients while acknowledging complete picture of a patient’s life situation.
- January 17, 2024, Microaggressions workshop – A focused session and workshop on tools to address microaggressions in the workplace.
Community Engagement
The emergency medicine resident physicians taught local high school students emergency department procedures to develop enthusiasm about the medical field. The high school students really enjoyed the session!
The emergency medicine resident physicians created care packages donated to Circle the City, a non-profit community health organization dedicated to providing health care to people experiencing homelessness in Maricopa County. As a department, we raised enough money to make 100 packages!
