An Intensive Approach to Improving Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in an Academic Emergency Department

A healthcare workforce that demonstrates cultural competence and humility while reflecting the diversity of the surrounding community has the potential to significantly benefit the patient population it serves. In this context and given numerous societal influences and the events of 2020, the leadership of the Department of Emergency Medicine at Albany Medical Center recognized the need to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in multiple areas. These included premedical education, medical education, postgraduate medical education, faculty development, staff satisfaction, and patient care. The department formed a DEI taskforce that developed an ongoing, multipronged, interdisciplinary approach to address these important aspects of our work and clinical environment with the goals of improving staff wellbeing, reducing burnout, and promoting the health of our community. Our experience is shared here to illustrate how a small, dedicated team can implement a variety of DEI initiatives quickly and with relatively little cost at a large academic medical center.

Chromosome heteromorphisms and early recurrent abortions

In order to identify the role played by heterochromatic polymorphisms in miscarriage, an analysis was carried out on 257 couples, 137 of them with two or more abortions and 120 serving as a control. All couples were taken from two Italian populations: 77 cases and 70 controls came from an exogamic population whilst 60 cases and 50 controls came from an almost endogamic one. Out of the 137 cases, six couples in the exogamic and five in the endogamic groups were excluded because at least one partner had balanced chromosomal aberrations. Four controls from the exogamic group were also excluded for the same reason. The remaining 126 cases were analysed to detect the presence of chromosomal heteromorphism in one or both partners. The results suggested that chromosomal heteromorphism does not induce miscarriage. In fact, only one heteromorphism, inv(9)(p11q12), seems to be marginally related to recurrent abortion and only in the exogamic population. In addition no differences were found in the distribution of chromosomal heteromorphism in the couples analysed in relation to the number of abortions, i.e. two or more than two.