This announcement was first published on the AAMC website here.
Dr. Maura George, 2022 Arnold P. Gold Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award at the AAMC honoree.
The practice of medicine and the training of future physicians are fundamentally humanistic pursuits. And Maura George, MD, FACP, associate professor of medicine at Emory University School of Medicine and an internist at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia, embodies the best of this approach to clinical practice and teaching.
In one of her most impactful roles, Dr. George serves as a small group advisor to incoming students. In that capacity, she works closely with groups of 8 to 10 students, mentoring them throughout their four-year medical school careers. Over the years, she has helped shape the journeys of more than 50 medical students via this intensive advisory program.
Dr. George also serves as course director for Community Learning and Social Medicine, a fourth-year social medicine elective. Across these roles, she mentors and inspires about 140 new medical students each year.
Humanism has always been central to Dr. George’s pursuit of medical education and in her work as a clinician and student advisor. In 2006, she was selected by peers and faculty as the sole recipient in her medical school class of the Dr. Frederick Stenn Memorial Award for Humanism in Medicine. Since then, she has furthered compassion in medicine as a clinician-educator, aiming to boost the humanist ideals of medicine and medical education.
For her efforts, in 2017, Dr. George was honored with the Student National Medical Association Emory Chapter Umoja Award for Unity. In 2019, she received the prestigious Evangeline T. Papageorge Distinguished Teaching Award, which is given by the Emory Medical Alumni Association to recognize a faculty member whose “intellectual luminosity has generated the greatest excitement about learning among students and colleagues.” That same year, she was also honored with the Vulcan Teaching Excellence Award, which is given through the Georgia Independent College Association and recognizes outstanding faculty members for classroom skills, leadership, and campus involvement.
“If you were to ask any medical student at Emory to name one physician they most equate with social medicine and advocacy, it is likely that their immediate answer, without hesitation, would be ‘Dr. George,’” said Elizabeth Zeichner, a medical student and member of the Organization of Student Representatives at Emory University School of Medicine.
In addition to advocating for equity in medicine and medical education, Dr. George is a compassionate caregiver who puts her patients and students first. “Community service lies at the heart of Dr. George’s clinical practice, and she empowers her students to take actions that will support community well-being,” Zeichner said.
Dr. George graduated from Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine in 2006 and completed her residency in internal medicine at Emory University.
Learn more about the Arnold P. Gold Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award at the AAMC.
