Milda Saunders, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Section of General Internal Medicine, has been appointed as the inaugural Assistant Dean for Multicultural Affairs, working closely with Dr. Monica Vela, Associate Dean for Multicultural Affairs, in providing key support to the students of the Pritzker School of Medicine..
Dr. Saunders received her medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and her Master’s in Public Health from Johns Hopkins University, before completing her residency in internal medicine and pediatrics at the University of Chicago. Dr. Saunders spent two years as a Hospitalist Scholar and a Fellow in the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics before joining our faculty in 2010. Dr. Saunders has also significantly developed her skills as a medical educator through completion of the Medical Education Research Innovation, Teaching, and Scholarship (MERITS) Fellowship. Currently, Dr. Saunders is the principal investigator of an R01 grant through NIDDK to look at the impact of an intensive patient referral and education program prior to renal replacement therapy, as well as another investigation to pilot test an interactive computer adaptive chronic kidney disease education program for hospitalized African-American patients. She has played a significant role over many years in mentoring medical students in research through our Scholarship and Discovery program and is well known to many of our students already as the Faculty Advisor for the Student National Medical Association.
Dr. Saunders’s responsibilities would involve individual student counseling and advising of students, as well as support and advising for school-sponsored affinity groups. Dr. Saunders would play a key part in the admissions process to matriculate a diverse cohort of students to the Pritzker School of Medicine on an annual basis. Dr. Saunders will also play an active role in the summer pathway programs sponsored by the Pritzker School of Medicine. Finally, Dr. Saunders is uniquely positioned to contribute to the expansion of health care disparities curriculum as a longitudinal thread throughout all four years of medical school education and to serve as a contributory member of the Identity to Inclusion (i2i) committee.