New Health Equity Track Set to Launch in July 2025
UT Southwestern is renowned for its Internal Medicine Residency training program, which has traditionally focused on preparing residents for subspecialty training. With more than 75 percent of graduates matching into subspecialty care nationwide, the program has been a proven leader in medical education.
The COVID-19 pandemic, however, highlighted a critical shortage of primary care physicians across the country.
"As the Dallas-Fort Worth area rapidly becomes one of the fastest-growing metropolitan areas in the U.S., UT Southwestern is stepping up to address this shortage," says Salahuddin "Dino" Kazi, M.D., a Professor in the Division of Rheumatic Diseases, Vice Chair of Education, and Program Director of the Internal Medicine Residency. "To this end, we are launching a new Health Equity Track, welcoming 15 residents per year, for a total of 45 residents over three years."
The Heath Equity Track, approved by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) and under the direction of Daniel Maxwell, M.D., will launch in July 2025, with recruitment beginning in September 2024.
The addition of the new track will bring the total program size to 241, making it the nation's second largest internal medicine residency program after Mount Sinai in New York.
"The Health Equity Track goes beyond traditional clinical training," Dr, Kazi says. "Residents will engage in Quality Improvement projects, gain a deep understanding of healthcare systems, and address social determinants of health. This innovative track is designed to cultivate leaders who can drive change and promote health equity through public health initiatives facilitated by a partnership with the O’Donnell School of Public Health."
Health Equity is an "aspirational goal," Dr. Kazi adds.
According to the World Health Organization, health equity is achieved when everyone can attain their full potential for health and well-being: "Progressively realizing the right to health means systematically identifying and eliminating inequities resulting from differences in health and in overall living conditions."
"I recognize that advancing health equity can be a daunting enterprise, and we may rightly worry that we do not have agency over social determinants of health (SDOH) or the deeply baked-in societal constructs that perpetuate health inequity," Dr. Kazi says. "Yet, much can be achieved by mitigating the effects of SDOH, embarking on small and big changes and simply by viewing our patients through these lenses."
By developing this new track and by focusing on new opportunities for the care of military veterans, the unhoused, those who are refugees, and by caring for people in the correctional system, "we aim to develop leaders in Health Equity to advance the health of these populations," Dr. Kazi says. "And we join a growing community of internal medicine residency training programs that have developed similar health equity tracks."
"By recruiting and training 15 interns annually, UT Southwestern will create a steady pipeline of primary care physicians equipped to serve the diverse needs of North Texas," Dr. Kazi says. "This initiative will significantly enhance the care provided to underserved populations, including indigent veterans, the unhoused, and refugees."
Dr. Maxwell, an Assistant Professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine, is "ideally suited" to guide this training track, particularly because 50 percent of its rotations will take place at the Dallas VA Medical Center, Dr. Kazi adds.
"UT Southwestern's new Health Equity Track is a bold step towards addressing the primary care shortage and promoting health equity," Dr. Maxwell says. "The collaboration with the O’Donnell School of Public Health and the integration with the VA positions our program as an ideal environment for developing expertise in implementation science and health equity."
Dr. Maxwell holds a bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, where he graduated magna cum laude. He earned his medical degree at the University of Alabama School of Medicine and completed internal medicine residency training at UT Southwestern, where he served as Chief Resident. Following deployment as a Command Surgeon in the U.S. Army and stateside work in emergency medicine, he served as an Aurora Fellow at Yambio State Hospital in South Sudan. He then returned to UT Southwestern and gained advanced training through fellowships in infectious diseases and critical care medicine.
In 2018, Dr. Maxwell earned a Meritorious Service Medal for his achievements during his military deployment. He joined the UT Southwestern faculty in 2023.