Division of Community and Global Health Equity

Our vision is a world where every person, in every community has the opportunity to be healthy.

We are educators, clinicians and researchers committed to understanding and promoting social justice and health equity within our practices and communities through teaching, social medicine and investigation.

Our objectives

Serve as the focal point within the Department of Internal Medicine (DOIM) for promoting and teaching principles of Health Equity, including scholarship, curricular development and deployment
Partner with like-minded organizations to advance equitable access to safe and high-quality care and health promotion activities to all populations served by RUSH University Medical Center (RUMC)
Work in innovative partnerships to empower communities served by RUMC locally and globally to promote population health equity, reduce health disparities and improve health outcomes for individuals and communities
Strengthen training in the Health Equity and Social Justice Leadership Program in RUSH Medical College, the Health Equity Residency Track and Elective in the IM Residency Program and the Global Health Fellowship with service and scholarship opportunities, locally and globally
Disseminate “state of the art” information on population health equity, quality of health services and assuring patient safety for all through the coordination of educational programming for RUMC, the DOIM and RUSH Medical College

Our Work

On

- Health Equity Track for Internal Medicine residents with a local health and global health branch
- Global Health Fellowship
- Global Health Elective for Internal Medicine residents
- Global Health Elective for M4 students
- Health Equity and Social Justice Program in the College of Medicine
- Health and Homelessness Elective for M4 students
- Diversity and Health Equity Curriculum for Internal Medicine residents
- Community Empowerment - NGO partner for Global Health activities in the Dominican Republic and Haiti
- CommunityHealth Clinic - Chicago clinic that provides free health care to uninsured patients, partners with Rush in bidirectional patient referrals, and hosts Rush residents for their continuity clinics and Nurse Practitioner students for training
- Rush BMO Harris Institute for Health Equity (RBIHE) - Rush institute that aims to reduce health disparities in Chicago communities through support of research, education, economic development, and clinical expertise
- Community-based COVID 19 vaccination and testing in congregate living settings
- Rush @Home Program
- Healthcare in homeless shelters through the Center to Transform Health and Housing
- Rush Medical College Admissions Diversity Work Group is ensuring that applications capture many dimensions of diversity
- The Annual Diversity Open House is held each fall to feature the diversity within the DOIM, and a panel is held each winter to give diverse applicants the opportunity to engage with current internal medicine residents
- Implicit bias training is in place to promote holisitc review for residency programs and faculty participating in interviews
- A demographics intake form was developed for onboarding to accurately track many dimensions of diversity
- A roundtable is held for all departments and residency programs that currently have DEI efforts or curricula at Rush
- Founding partners of HEART (Health Equity and Anti-Racism Transforming Clinical Care) and C-CARE (The Chicago Coalition for Anti-Racism and Equity in Health) Committees
- Eliminated race-based eGFR from all Rush campuses
- Implemented recommendations for BiDil use to all patients, not only patients who identify as Black
- Areas currently in process include: pulmonary function tests, pulse oximetry, JNC 8 hypertension guidelines, ASCVD Risk Score, National Kidney Donor Index, vaginal birth after caesarean risk score and prenatal AFP
- Research through Chicago Chronic Condition Equity Network addressing health disparities in the burden of multiple chronic diseases that are attributed to racial segregation and gaps in economic opportunities in the healthcare system
- Work with the Alive Church Network, a long-standing coalition of Black pastors and public health researchers, which has created a network of church-based COVID-19 testing and education, and linkage to healthcare and social resources
- COVID-19 Health Disparities Research to characterize disparities by race/ethnicity, language preference, and others
- Research examining how hospitalists underrepresented in medicine define success
- Project assessing food insecurity and its effects among patients with diabetes in the rural community of Villa Verde in the Dominican Republic

Our People

Division Chief: Stephanie Crane, MD

Internal Medicine, Ambulatory
Office of Global Health, RUMC
Stephanie_Crane@rush.edu

Richard Abrams, MD

Internal Medicine, Ambulatory
Richard_Abrams@rush.edu

Ramesh Allam, MD

Internal Medicine, Infectious Diseases
Internal Medicine Elective Partner, Hyderabad, India
Rameshallam@sharefoundation.org

David Ansell, MD

Internal Medicine, Ambulatory
Senior Vice President for Community Health Equity
Co-Director, Rush BMO Harris Institute for Health Equity
David_Ansell@rush.edu

Mariam Aziz, MD

Med/Peds, Infectious Diseases
Fellowship Director, Infectious Diseases
Program Director, Global Health Elective, RMC
Mariam_Aziz@rush.edu

Amanda Bradke, MD

Internal Medicine, Hospitalist
Co-Director, Global Health Fellowship
Program Director, Global Health Elective, IM Residency
Chair, HEART Committee
Amanda_J_Bradke@rush.edu