By Sarah Sargent
Now a rite of passage among medical students in the US, the White Coat Ceremony began at the University of Chicago in 1989 when Norma Wagoner, PhD, then Pritzker’s Dean of Students, and Holly J. Humphrey, MD’83, MACP (1956-2025), then Pritzker’s Dean for Medical Education, envisioned a new tradition.
Wagoner conceived the ceremony as a way to help first year medical students see themselves as physicians. She worked with Eugene Geppert, MD, who taught the Introduction to Medicine class for first-year students, where faculty physicians would bring a patient to class and engage with the students in an interview and dialogue. The white coat emphasized student’s commitment to professionalism and patient care.
“Pritzker was engaged in making changes to the curriculum that involved a greater investment of time in early clinical introduction for entering medical students,” Wagoner recalled. “I wanted to set expectations for student behavior during important patient interactions. I asked Dr. Geppert to invest each student with their long white coat, upon which their name had been sewn.” Students were then expected to wear their white coats to class.
The meaning of the white coat
Humphrey worked with Wagoner to shape the ceremony. She later wrote about delivering the keynote address at the first White Coat Ceremony: “I remember sharing my earliest memories of the white coat—memories not from my years as a student or as a physician, but as a nine-year-old child when my younger sister was in a coma. For my family and me, the white coat was a symbol of hope. A symbol worn by the professionals on whose every word we clung as my sister struggled to live, and nearly died, with newly diagnosed diabetes.”
The white coat symbolized that students would uphold Pritzker’s standards of clinical excellence. “I was part of a university with a vested interest in me, not just a relatively anonymous student trying to keep my head above water,” said David Litvak, MD’93. “I was a chosen ambassador.”
Carrying inspiration into a career in medicine
The ceremony provided enduring inspiration, and participants recalled a lasting impact on their careers.
“If I could speak to my younger self on the day of my White Coat Ceremony, I would say, ‘Always place the patient at the center of your work, remain intellectually curious, embrace cross-disciplinary collaboration, and never stop learning.’ Those principles have guided my career in research, education, and mentorship,” said Tzung Hsiai, MD’93, PhD.