New England Donor Services recently completed the inaugural year of a summer program for medical students attending medical school in the region. The Galen V. Henderson, MD Program was an 8-week immersive experience to raise awareness about the role of organ donation and transplantation in healthcare, to understand inequities in transplantation and to learn about potential career paths in organ donation and transplantation. One participant of the program, Riley Cable of the University of Connecticut Medical School, said,
“This program is a great opportunity to get exposure to a surgical field while learning about transplantation … From scrubbing in for organ recovery surgeries to hearing from donor families or meeting physician leaders in the field, it’s been an awesome experience.”
The program engages students through:
- Seminars and Discussions: Weekly sessions with national and international experts cover topics like organ failure, transplantation history, donor management, organ allocation, racial disparities, ethical considerations, and emerging innovations. Students also participate in journal clubs and engage with transplant leaders, donor families, and recipients.
- Experiential Learning: Students observe organ donor recovery and transplant surgeries, witness organ matching/allocation decisions, interact with transplant patients and donor families, and attend community events to promote organ donation awareness.
- Scholarly Project: Participants complete a mentored research project, such as a study, data analysis, or review, presented at the program’s end during a celebratory luncheon.
- Mentorship and Networking: Guidance from NEDS researchers and professionals with Harvard Medical School affiliations, alongside networking opportunities.
Henderson Program student Jaime Bozeman of the Warren Albert Medical School of Brown University, said,
“It’s more like what I would call a very in-depth internship, where we get to understand the relationships between organ donors and transplant recipients. We get to hear their testimonies regarding the process and outcomes. As medical students we get to observe every aspect of the organ donor process, including actual surgeries. I got to see a surgery that began at 2:00 PM and ended at 3:00 AM. The best part of the program is seeing the impact organ donations have on people’s lives.”
The program is already gearing up for the summer of 2026 and preparing for the application process that will begin in the early winter.