Advocacy & Community Outreach

The WUSM student chapter of the American Medical Association (AMA) serves as a patient and medical student advocate, supports volunteer work in the St. Louis community and sponsors educational events to foster creative discussion among medical students.

WUSM’s chapter of the American Medical Women’s Association (AMWA) is an organization which functions from the local to international level to advance women in medicine and improve women’s health.

The Asian-Pacific American Medical Student Association (APAMSA) is dedicated to advocating quality health care for the Asian-Pacific American (APA) community, increasing awareness of APA health issues, providing outreach opportunities for APA med students, and celebrating diversity of Asian cultures.

CHOICES (Choosing Healthy Options In our Community, Environment, and Schools) for Youth in Detention is an innovative outreach effort dedicated to improving the health and wellbeing of incarcerated teens.

The Dementia Understanding and Outreach (DUO) fosters interest in geriatric medicine, engages in community outreach with local older adult organizations, and partners with the Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center for the Dementia Understanding Opportunities program.

Giving a Boost (GAB) is a volunteer-driven organization established to support pre-medical students lacking access to mentors in medicine. Comprised of current medical students, our goal is to provide free personalized mentorship to students from all backgrounds. By offering guidance on medical school applications free of cost, we aim to alleviate the financial burden, reduce disparities in the application process, and help create a diverse group of future physicians. While we cannot assure that our services will guarantee acceptance into medical school, we aim to reduce the stress of applications for our mentees, and we volunteer our time to provide the guidance that we ourselves wished for during this journey.

The Mission of the Health Career Collaborative is to provide mentorship, engaging health curriculum, and exposure to health careers to high school students from underrepresented minority communities.

Health Screening Education Group (HSEG) seeks to provide the opportunity for students to practice clinical and communication skills in a low-stakes environment ahead of any volunteering opportunities with HOPs in the St. Louis community.

Originally founded as the Saturday Neighborhood Health Clinic (SNHC) in 1997, the Student Interprofessional Free Clinic provides compassionate and skilled care to uninsured and underinsured residents of the greater St. Louis community. Led by Washington University School of Medicine health professional students and supported by current faculty, individuals receive temporary medical care from interprofessional clinical teams while consulting with our clinic’s community referral coordinator for assistance in finding affordable and quality primary care.

The Latino Medical Student Association (LMSA) is a national student group whose vision is to unite and empower medical students through service, mentorship and education, advocating for the health of the Latino community.

The mission of the LGBTQ Med group is to improve health care for LGBTQ patients. We work toward this goal by educating medical students on health disparities in this population and the factors that affect LGBTQ access to care and quality of care.

LouHealth partners with local organizations in support of their ongoing advocacy efforts. Specifically, we focus on advocacy related to three areas: Health access and equity, criminal justice reform, and intimate partner violence survivor support.

Medical Students For Choice is an organization that aims to educate WUSM students about contraception and abortion, as well as encourage them to explore their personal beliefs about the full range of reproductive rights.

Pediatric Life Savers teaches CPR classes to the families of infants in the NICU of St. Louis Children’s Hospital so that these primary caretakers learn how to respond to certain medical emergencies prior to taking their infants home.

The goal of the Perinatal Project is to provide opportunities for interested students to explore the fields of obstetrics, maternal-fetal medicine, and the patient experience through relationships with expectant mothers staying in the antepartum unit.

Science and Healthcare Abilities Coalition (SHAC) aims to create a community by and for students with disabilities and chronic illnesses and their allies.

The Student National Medical Association (SNMA) is the nation’s oldest and largest student organization focused on the needs and concerns of medical students of color.

The purpose of Students for Sight is to connect and collaborate with local groups that are dedicated to helping youth who are blind and visually impaired and their families. Specifically, to empower these children and teenagers to reach their full potential and help them build a community of support. This will be accomplished by helping recruit volunteers to staff the regularly scheduled events at the Delta Gamma Center, plan new events for the Delta Gamma Center, and potentially partner with other organizations such as the Missouri School for the Blind if there is a need.

The Sun Protection Outreach Teaching by Students (SPOTS) group works with SLU med students to teach local middle- and high-school students about early detection of and preventative measures against skin cancer.

The goal of The Catnips - Feline Interest Group is to foster a community of cat lovers who are willing to provide food and shelter for our furry friends. It is to encourage students to save lives and to provide platform for pet owners/ foster parents to share advice and resources. We are hoping that by creating a supportive network, more students are able to overcome barriers and enable them to have the pets they wanted.

The purpose of Unhoused Health is to create a centralized and official student group interested in unhoused public service and street medicine. Currently, there are few opportunities for students to be involved in unhoused outreach or volunteering, and this student group would serve as a centralized core of students that will create opportunities to learn about the unique challenges unhoused people face, both generally and specifically in terms of seeking medical care. This club will allow students to engage with unhoused people and learn what it is like to live unhoused in St. Louis. This club will expand the diversity of educational experiences, especially those related to health equity and structural barriers.

WUSM Sustainability works to promote and achieve greater sustainability in WUSM and the greater medical school community through initiatives (e.g. reusable anatomy gloves), educational interventions (e.g. Climate Change series), and collaboration.