Aspiring D.O.s Receive White Coats

The College of Osteopathic Medicine (NYITCOM) welcomed incoming students at its annual White Coat Ceremonies in Jonesboro, Ark., and Long Island, N.Y., where a total of more than 400 aspiring osteopathic physicians (D.O.s) received white coats.

Widely viewed as the official start of medical school, the annual celebrations signify the beginning of students’ medical education journey. The white coat has served as a symbol of cleanliness, trust, and healing since the late 1800s, when physicians began adopting the lab coats worn by scientists to align themselves with the increasingly scientific approach to medicine. Today, medical students wear shorter white coats while in training and longer coats when entering the field as physicians.

At this year’s White Coat Ceremonies, the incoming class prepared to fill the shoes of the Class of 2025, whose members achieved a match rate of more than 99 percent and earned residencies at esteemed institutions such as Georgetown University (emergency medicine), Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center (internal medicine), Penn State Hershey Medical Center (anesthesiology), and Yale New Haven Health (pediatrics), among many others. In addition, 14 physicians are currently completing their residencies in branches of the U.S. Armed Forces.

NYITCOM-Arkansas

NYITCOM-Arkansas celebrated the Class of 2029 on August 2 at the Arkansas State University Fowler Center. The cohort represents the tenth class to attend NYITCOM’s Jonesboro location, which was established in 2016 to train physicians to help alleviate the significant physician shortage facing Arkansas and the Greater Mississippi Delta region.

Ahead of students’ orientation, New York Tech President Jerry Balentine, D.O., joined NYITCOM Dean Nicole Wadsworth, D.O., NYITCOM-Arkansas Site Dean Shane Speights, D.O., and Associate Dean of Academics and Graduate Medical Education Amanda Deel, D.O., in welcoming the new class.  

“We are extremely proud of the impact our campus has made over our first decade in Arkansas, and we’re excited about how this most recent class will build on those successes and make a difference in healthcare and health education in this part of the country where the needs are so significant,” said Speights.

NYITCOM faculty members coat many of the incoming students, but those with a physician in their immediate family are invited to have their relative join them on stage for the ceremony. Jonesboro native Ashley Lamkin was among those who took advantage of that special opportunity as she was coated by her father, Tony Lamkin, M.D., a wound care specialist with St. Bernards Healthcare.

“It means a lot to me to have my dad coat me because he has been my hero for a very long time,” Lamkin said. “Being able to follow in his footsteps and do the same thing as him is a really big deal for me. He cares so much about his patients, and he’s exactly the kind of physician I want to be.”

The ceremony also included the presentation of the third-annual Dr. Michael and Julie Isaacson Scholarship. Funded by a gift from the Sidney and Mary Ann Arnold Foundation, the scholarship supports the medical education of students from certain Arkansas counties who are interested in ultimately practicing in one of the state’s medically underserved communities. Gracie Fulks, of Jonesboro, and Gage West, of Stuttgart, Ark., were honored as this year’s recipients.

NYITCOM-Long Island

NYITCOM-Long Island’s ceremony took place on August 12 at the Crest Hollow Country Club in Woodbury, N.Y.

Here, President Balentine, Wadsworth, Vice Chair for the Board of Trustees Daniel Ferrara (D.O. ’86), and other physicians and alumni congratulated the 323 incoming students on the start of a rewarding and strenuous journey, including pediatric emergency medicine physician Elizabeth Haines (D.O. ’05). Haines, who serves as service chief of quality and the patient safety officer at Hassenfeld Children’s Hospital at NYU Langone, delivered keynote remarks, challenging the class to bring a “level up” mentality to their future clinical experiences.

“When it’s 2 a.m. and your senior resident sends you down to the emergency room to take a new admission, level up. When it’s 5:30 p.m. on a Friday and you have [concert] tickets, but nobody can get an IV in the four-year-old in room 904, level up…when you make your first error—and you will—own it with honesty and with accountability, because that’s a ‘level up.’ When you notice someone on your clinical team is having a hard day or needs reassurance, bolster them…and when others show that they too can level up, call it out, because that’s exponentially leveling up.”

Students were also gifted with engraved, personalized stethoscopes funded by the generosity of many NYITCOM donors, including Ferrara, who led the presentation of the gifts. NYITCOM-Long Island began this tradition in 2019, with each stethoscope serving as a vital tool throughout students’ time at medical school and as a memento that will accompany them into their professional careers, reminding them of their NYITCOM roots.

Casey Pearce contributed to this article.