February: a month often associated with everlasting love and candy hearts. More than 200 couples share the distinction of being dual MU School of Medicine graduates, including David and Whitney Lane.
Their mutual friends set the two up on a blind date while in undergrad, saying they had so much in common. Both were involved in Greek life and were Conley Scholars, a program that allowed qualifying high school graduates to be pre-admitted to the MU medical school.
A blind date would turn into forever.
“We just actually celebrated our 30-year anniversary of that date,” David Lane said. “It was on December 4, 1993.”
As the Lanes were falling in love, the School of Medicine was implementing the new patient-based learning (PBL) curriculum that same year. When 25 years passed, and the medical school reached out to alumni couples to support the newly endowed PBL-25 Scholarship, they were one of the first to respond.
“We both have such good memories of those PBL groups,” Whitney Lane said. “That was such a strong part of our training, we just felt it needed to continue as part of the curriculum.”
The PBL curriculum is fundamental to how they treat patients today, David said.
The Lanes were a year apart in training, which “presented some challenges” as the two navigated medical school and residency. The two specialized in dermatology and completed their residencies in Columbia, after which David completed a fellowship in Mohs micrographic and dermatologic surgery. They now live in North Carolina with two girls.
They’ve never forgotten Columbia, though; it’s the birthplace of their love, their education and their careers. In fact, the Lanes still visit Columbia regularly, often stopping by during football season to catch a few games. With their scholarship support, and a named PBL Lab in the Patient-Centered Care Learning Center (PCCLC), they’ve impacted the training of current and future medical students.
“The biggest thing that motivates us to stay involved as alumni is that we were (in Columbia) for quite a period of time, so it's been such a large part of our lives,” David said. “It was an extremely difficult decision to leave, but it was not a difficult decision to stay involved with the medical school and try to give back as much as we can, in any way that we can.”
