Monday, April 20, 2009

History Essay Deadline Extended

The deadline for the McLendon-Thomas Award in the History of Medicine has been extended to May 31, 2009. Open to all current UNC-CH students in Dentistry, Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, Public Health, and Allied Health, the award is sponsored by the Bullitt History of Medicine Club and offers a prize of $500 for the best essay on any aspect of the history of the health sciences. Visit the Bullitt Club web site for essay guidelines.

Funded by UNC alumni S. Gregory Boyd (MD '03, JD '04) and Laura Boyd (JD '02), the McLendon-Thomas Award honors Dr. William McLendon and Dr. Colin Thomas, Jr. and recognizes scholarly excellence in the history of health sciences. Greg and Laura Boyd live in New York City, where he is an attorney with Davis & Gilbert LLP and she is a legal recruiter with SJL Attorney Search. Greg considers the history of medicine to be one of the most important aspects of his medical education and and Drs. McClendon and Thomas among the best role models possible. They both strongly believe that the history of medicine represents a critical perspective and focus on the art of medicine that are necessary for training the best possible physicians, health care executives, and policy makers.

Dr. William W. McLendon served from 1973-1995 at UNC as Director of the Hospital Clinical Laboratories and as Professor and Vice-Chair of Pathology. Since his retirement in 1995 he has been Professor Emeritus of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. An MD graduate of UNC in 1956, he and Bob Whitlock (MD '57) were the student co-founders in 1954 of the Bullitt History of Medicine Club. Dr. McLendon is the co-author, along with the late Drs. William Blythe and Floyd Denny, of the recently published Bettering the Health of the People: W. Reece Berryhill, the UNC School of Medicine, and the North Carolina Good Health Movement.

Dr. Colin G. Thomas, Jr. joined the faculty of the UNC School of Medicine in 1952, and is currently Byah Thomason-Sanford Doxey Professor of Surgery. From 1966-1984 he served as Chair of the Department of Surgery, and from 1984-1989 as Chief of the Division of General Surgery. Dr. Thomas was one of the early faculty members of the Bullitt History of Medicine Club, and is the co-author, along with Mary Jane Kagarise, of the 1997 history, Legends and
Legacies: A Look Inside: Four Decades of Surgery at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1952-1993
.

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