HONOLULU (KHON2) — The University of Hawaii John A Burns School of Medicine Dean for Academic Affairs, Dr. Lee Buenconsejo-Lum, was recently awarded Family Physician of the Year by the Hawaii Academy of Family Physicians.
After decades of serving families in Hawaii, Dr. Buenconsejo-Lum said she is humbled and honored.
“We go into this profession just really to serve our patients, especially those who may have chronic conditions or very complicated lives, and that’s what’s beautiful about family medicine is you have the privilege of caring about them from birth until death across all settings,” she said. “Really understanding the individuals within the context of their families and communities.”
This award comes at a time when Hawaii is still grappling with a physician shortage especially in the areas of Primary Care, which includes Family Medicine.
“We’re really very thankful for the legislature and the Governor with the Hawaii Healthcare Education Loan Repayment Program,” Dr. Buenconsejo-Lum noted. “That’s not only for physicians; it’s for nurses and advance practice nurse practitioners and physician assistants, the whole team, because it really does take a team to care for our community.”
Dr. Buenconsejo-Lum explained further.
“Besides from that honestly housing, it’s a challenge for all of us, but we’re also working on scholarships, other things to kind of get the cost down,” Dr. Buenconsejo-Lum added. “The real biggest challenge is working with our federal partners to try to get a reimbursement hire and decrease some other barriers because that’s in fact what’s contributing to some early retirements and other things.”
Dr. Buenconsejo-Lum’s award also comes at a time of celebration for JABSOM. The US News and World Report rankings came out recently, and JABSOM is a Tier One Medical School for Primary Care.
“I think it number one means we’re providing excellent training for our physicians not only in primary care but across the specialties. What that ranking means is we’re doing our mission. We were created over 60 years ago to make sure that local kids who wanted to serve could actually learn here and serve their patients here. We’re actually happy that so many of our students are choosing to go into our primary care and even if they do have to go away for fellowship training or other specialties, we are seeing more of them return home, and so that’s really encouraging as well.”