School of Medicine Reunion Weekend to bring back distinguished alumni

This year’s Tulane University School of Medicine Reunion Weekend will celebrate the classes of 1978, 1983, 1988, 1993, 1998, 2003, 2008, and 2013. Among the graduates returning for the weekend are two top leaders in the field of medicine, and there are opportunities to hear both speak ahead of the reunion events.

Admiral Rachel L. Levine, MD, earned her medical degree from Tulane in 1983. She worked as a pediatrician, adolescent medicine specialist, and professor of pediatrics and psychiatry at the Penn State Hershey Medical Center for many years before her appointment as the state’s physician general. Levine is now the Assistant Secretary for Health at the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.

Levine will talk about climate change and how it impacts health at a conversation and question and answer session Thursday, March 23. The event will be held in the Hutchinson Auditorium from 3:15 – 4:15 pm, with a reception to follow. The discussion is free and open to the public. She’ll also join Karen DeSalvo, MD, for this Murphy Institute event Friday night.

Another distinguished alumnus returning for reunion weekend is Debra Houry, MD, MPH, who earned her MD/MPH at Tulane in 1998. Houry now serves as Chief Medical Office and Deputy Director for Program and Science at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Houry will join the Department of Medicine for Grand Rounds Wednesday, March 22 at noon, and talk about addressing the opioid epidemic. She’ll also be the distinguished speaker at a lecture about public health and medicine Thursday, March 23. That event will be held at noon in the Diboll Auditorium in the Tidewater Building. Attendees can register for the free discussion here.

“It’s a tremendous honor to have Drs. Levine and Houry return and share their expertise,” said L. Lee Hamm, MD, Senior Vice President and Dean of Tulane University School of Medicine. “Both of these physicians are at the top of their fields, and it’s inspiring to know their medical careers began here at Tulane.”