Students use tech to cite medical oath together

Graduating medical students from around the globe used technology to recite the Hippocratic oath together Monday.

The made the oath simultaneously in their respective languages via Zoom and FaceTime Live.

Reciting the Hippocratic oath is a rite of passage for medical school graduates.

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, medical school graduations are either being canceled or planned virtually. Globally, many medical students in the class of 2020 are graduating early to join others on the frontlines in service to their communities as new physicians.

Dr. Katayoun Madani and Dr. Mamta Swaroop of Northwestern Medicine in Chicago organized the event to honor the graduates.

"We wanted them to know that we were standing with them in solidarity, that we're always with them," says Dr. Swaroop.

Dr. Madani says the Hippocratic oath is "the most special thing that bonds all physicians together, everywhere in the world, no matter what language we speak, no matter where we go to school."

Madani is a Northwestern Medicine global surgery fellow in the division of trauma and critical care surgery, and Swaroop, is an associate professor of surgery and the director of the Center for Global Surgery in the Institute of Global Health at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

(Representative Image)