Usatine, Richard Phillip MD

School of Medicine
Family & Community Medicine
(210) 358-3200
usatine@uthscsa.edu

I am motivated to provide medical students the opportunity to give back to the community by working in our free clinics for underserved women or homeless families. In partnership with our medical students, we developed the new Alpha Home and SAMM student run clinics for our medical school. My philosophy of teaching involves service-learning in the community. I have been doing this with students since 1990 when we started a student-run homeless clinic in a transitional housing village in Los Angeles. I had the pleasure of helping to start 3 other programs to provide care to homeless persons.

I am very conscious of the importance of being a good role model for our students. I derive great pleasure from working with vulnerable populations in the community. I believe it is very important for physicians to give back to their communities and I want students to see their faculty living this ideal. I am motivated to inspire students to become excellent doctors who are caring and concerned about their patients and communities. As a teacher, I advocate for a health care system and medical education system that is humane and responsive to the needs of our population including the needs of the most vulnerable persons in our world.

As the founder and medical director of the University Health System Skin Clinic in San Antonio, I work to see that underserved patients have access to medical and surgical care for their dermatological needs. I am the lead author of the book Skin Surgery: A Practical Guide. He is the national chair of the yearly Skin Course put on by the American Academy of Family Physicians. Dr. Usatine is the founder of the Interactive Dermatology Atlas on the web http://www.dermatlas.net and the editor of Photo Rounds in the Journal of Family Practice. Dr. Usatine is the year 2000 recipient of a National Humanism in Medicine Award from the Association of American Medical Colleges. Since 2000, he has been chosen yearly by his peers to be included in The Best Doctors in America.