The Duke Department of Surgery is dedicated to fostering a maintaining a safe and inclusive environment where all our trainees can thrive.
We recognize the impact that all forms of discrimination have had on the history of our institution, our programs, our fields of study and practice, and our country. This has affected patient care, education, trainee and faculty well-being, and the culture of our programs.
Over the past several years, we have begun the work of addressing this legacy of discrimination that has imprinted on our nation's healthcare system and our own institution, and we understand that there is much more work yet to be done to mitigate the impact of racial, religious, gender, and sexual orientation based discrimination on our institution and beyond.
Our commitment to these principles stands as one of the pillars of our training programs, especially as this allows us to thoughtfully serve and care for our diverse patient population. We will continue actively highlighting, growing, and supporting a sustainable, diverse, equitable, and inclusive workforce.
We commit to:
- Recruiting, retaining, fostering, and sponsoring a diverse group of trainees, including those who identify as underrepresented in medicine and surgery,
- Engaging with our community through targeted and intentional interventions to interact with and improve the health of Durham and our surrounding patient populations in ways that can be generalized nationally and globally,
- Continuing to foster an environment where challenging conversations are seen as opportunities for growth, development, and discovery, and
- Pledging to be better tomorrow than we are today.