Page 7 - Women Unlimited | Rochester Medicine | University of Rochester Medical Center

Cullen says. “I use my privilege as a man, and a white man, to room, but are there women of color? Then the next part of this
advocate for equity. The work is slow, and it’s going to be slow. is, even if they have a seat at the table, do they have a voice? Are
But we are not going to shift the needle quickly enough until we they being heard?”
get men involved. They have a responsibility to do this.”
Chaudron, chair of the AAMC GWIMS Steering Committee,
For his perspectives on male allyship and the need to support praises Mark B. Taubman, MD, URMC CEO and dean of the
women in academic biomedical research, AAMC, in November School of Medicine and Dentistry, for his part in helping to
2017, appointed Cullen to its Group on Women in Medicine and answer these questions.
Science Steering Committee—the first man to be selected to join
the group. “There are always places we can improve,” she says, “but his
clear commitment to gender equity and academic advancement
“We often go into a room and see who has a seat at the table, has really sent a message to people that this is important and we
but it’s more important to flip that and see who doesn’t have a need to address it head-on.”
seat at the table,” Cullen says. “Maybe there are women in the

Their Stories

Vivian Lewis’s class in medical school, at Columbia menopause, in vitro fertilization, and hormone
University College of Physicians and Surgeons, was replacement therapy.
considered quite progressive in the 1970s—about
one-third of the students were women. Being promoted from associate professor to full
professor “was an interesting step for me and a
“I was part of a kind of sea change,” she says. “The turning point,” Lewis says, because she was the only
senior class looked very different.” underrepresented minority in that role. “There had
been one before me, but that person had moved on, and
Although the residency programs she considered had now it was my turn.”
hardly any women faculty, about half her peers in the
residency she chose, in obstetrics and gynecology at She didn’t understand why. There were few female full
Mount Sinai School of Medicine of City University, professors as it was, though she knew many women
were women. who deserved to be moving up the ranks. And she knew
other ethnic minorities who’d left their jobs in frustration
“Honestly, we were the stronger ones,” she says. because they felt they were hitting the glass ceiling.
“We were overachievers. We felt the expectations
were greater for us.” “I thought, ‘I deserve this promotion, and yet I shouldn’t
be so unique. This is ridiculous,’” she says.
By the time Lewis came to the University of Rochester
Medical Center in 1991 as an associate professor and From that promotion in early 2000 until July 2019, Vivian Lewis, MD
to lead the Division of Reproductive Endocrinology, Lewis was the only female African American full
she was enthusiastically helping to advance a field professor throughout the entire university. Vice Provost for Faculty Development
and Diversity in the Provost’s
continuously expanding in scope and impact. Office
Lewis, who retired in September but continues to
“Reproductive endocrinology barely existed when I work for the university part time, is proud of the way University of Rochester
was coming along, so part of what attracted me was science and medicine around women’s health and Professor of Obstetrics and
that it seemed like an open canvas, with so much to be reproduction have expanded choices available to Gynecology
discovered,” she says. female practitioners and patients—in large part due to University of Rochester School of
the women’s movement. Medicine and Dentistry
Lewis has been chair of the advisory committee on
reproductive health drugs for the Food and Drug “You can’t separate the two, and that’s for the better
Administration since 2014. Aside from reproductive of health care,” she says. “Not to say women are solely
endocrinology, her areas of expertise include infertility, responsible. But we’ve made our mark.”

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