Former surgeon general to headline Indiana health summit
A national leader in the fight to eliminate racial and ethnic disparities in health and health care will headline an April summit for health-care professionals, students policymakers and others.
David Satcher
Dr. David Satcher, who served as the nation's 16th surgeon general, will deliver the keynote address for the 9th annual Indiana Conference on Cultural Competency for Behavior Healthcare on Thursday, April 29.
The conference will take place from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at the Holiday Inn North at the Pyramids, 3850 DePauw Blvd., Indianapolis. The keynote presentation will take place from 8:45 to 10:15 a.m.
Conference sponsors include the IUPUI Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; the IU School of Medicine; the Indiana Minority Health Coalition; and two state agencies.
The event focuses on the theme "Beyond Cultural Competency: What's Next?" and aims to enhance cultural competence by heightening awareness of its impact in health care.
"Culture is important . . . It influences how people manifest and describe illness; how they cope; the type of stresses they experience and whether they are willing to seek treatment. It influences how people eat, how people are physically active or inactive," Satcher said in a 2008 speech about the challenges facing the U.S. health-care system.
"Somehow, we have to deal with culture if we are going to be successful . . . We know now that physicians misdiagnosis problems because they don't understand the culture of the patient. We have got to do a much better job of preparing our (public health) students to deal with a diverse culture."
A former president of Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Satcher is currently director of the Satcher Health Leadership Institute at Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta, Ga.
Registration is required for the conference. The fee is $95. Deadline for registration is April 16. For online registration, go to this web site: http://www.imhc.org/103/cc10.html. A limited number of fee scholarships are available for students who wish to attend.
