Letter from Ann Price, MD
Dear Vanderbilt Medical Alumni,
This spring has been a very interesting and difficult time for many people, and I hope that each of you and your families have stayed safe throughout this pandemic. As some of you may have heard, Vanderbilt has decided to postpone Reunion 2020’s date, due to the pandemic. Reunion will now be held in the Fall of 2021. While we are disappointed by this, we believe it is the best decision in order to keep everyone safe and slow the spread of COVID-19. We will also celebrate our Distinguished Alums: Aubrey J. Hough, MD, and Jean R. Anderson, MD, as well as our Distinguished Service Award Winner, Mrs. Edie C. Johnson at Reunion 2021. The VMAA is very excited about the opportunity to host Reunion in 2021, and the following VUSM classes will be celebrated at a special anniversary class party then.
Even though all students were removed from Vanderbilt’s campus in March and all of our events were canceled or postponed to a later date, the VMAA has stayed very busy by continuing to support our current students, alums and numerous other activities. The VMAA is excited to announce and welcome four new members to the VMAA board. Our new house staff representative is Kaele M. Leonard and the VUSM representative is Karampreet Kaur. Our Specialty Society representative for the Burnett Society is Celeste Hemingway. The Infectious Disease Society representative is Celestine Wanjalla, the Vanderbilt Urology Society representative is Niels Johnson, and our new Lynch Society representative is Brian C. Drolet. We are excited about these new members joining us and are thankful for the members who are serving another term. On the student side of our membership, the VMAA served again as a sponsor for our student-led Shade Tree Trot (5k). The trot was held virtually with participants completing 3.2 miles on their own and submitting their times. The VMAA staff mailed over 800 T-shirts and almost $75K was raised in donations for the Shade Tree Clinic. We have also been busy shipping out multiple gifts to our VMS II class, the Departing House Staff, as well as our 2020 recent medical school graduates, who would have received these gifts at their respective events. A big thanks to all of our medical alumni who served as hosts and mentors for the Class of 2020. As always, if you are not yet a volunteer for one of these programs and would like to learn more, please see https://medschool.vanderbilt.edu/alumni/.
Hearing from you is one of the most enjoyable aspects of my role with the VMAA. Please take a moment to submit your “Worthy of Note” news for our next edition of Vanderbilt Medicine. Send your news and photographs to medalum@vanderbilt.edu; fax to (615) 936-8475; or mail to VUMC, 21st Avenue South and Medical Center Drive, MCN D-8212, Nashville, Tennessee 37232-2106.
Stay safe and we hope to hear from you soon.
Best Wishes,
