Tao Le ’91 launches Medical Student Alliance for Global Education

Dr. Tao Le ’91, an internationally recognized medical educator, physician executive and seasoned entrepreneur, recently announced the public launch of the Medical Student Alliance for Global Education (MeSAGE).

Le is the founder and CEO of ScholarRx, a mission-driven organization currently serving over 150,000 medical students and physician learners annually. ScholarRx co-founded MeSAGE in 2019 with a broad coalition of U.S. and international medical student organizations to empower students worldwide with the tools and training that allow them to work together to address educational gaps often found in traditional medical school curricula—important areas such as diversity and inclusion, climate change and social justice.

“Through MeSAGE, we are excited to partner with leading student organizations to address educational needs at a global and societal level and help medical students define, build and learn the key emerging concepts that may be missing from the standard curriculum,” Le says.

Those organizations represent over 1 million medical students in over 130 countries, from partners including:

AMSA: The American Medical Student Association
AMWA: The American Medical Women’s Association
EMSA: The European Medical Students’ Association
IFMSA: International Federation of Medical Students Associations
Phi Delta Epsilon: The International Medical Fraternity
SNMA: The Student National Medical Association
SOMA: The Student Osteopathic Medical Association

Using the ScholarRx digital learning platform, MeSAGE is building interactive educational modules known as “Bricks” that address a wide range of topics, from health equity and human rights to medical education and digital health. The platform leverages the expertise and passion of medical students to develop engaging and instructionally sound medical education content.

“Medical students are authoring the content under expert faculty guidance through ScholarRx,” Le says. “That work goes through a rigorous vetting process so that educators and students can trust the content, allowing us to provide the highest level of quality while still maintaining the student voice.” 

Bricks created by this collaborative work are interactive lessons in which content is broken down into the smallest cohesive learning units and organized around various medical science topics (e.g., DNA synthesis and heart disease). Many are less than 20 minutes in length and offer built-in review tools to test understanding of the content right away.

"I think one of the big ideas we're trying to convey with MeSAGE is that medical students can contribute to their own education in a very deep and meaningful way if given the right opportunity and guidance," Le says. "We feel that students can change the world and should be given a seat at the table when it comes to their own education and curricular needs." 

MeSAGE's first curriculum collection covers the critical area of Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights. Topics include:

Introduction to Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Gender Expression
Sexual Function and Satisfaction
Taking a Sexual History
Family Planning, Infertility and Preconception
Safe Abortion
Gender-Based Violence

Upcoming MeSAGE collections include:

Diversity, equity and inclusion
Digital health
Student as educator and change agent
Social accountability

Students, schools and institutions from around the world can use the open-access MeSAGE curriculum on Rx Bricks for free at https://scholarrx.com/mesage.

Le's launch into entrepreneurship came early in his career.

"The inspiration actually started 30 years ago while I was in medical school at the University of California San Francisco. I had envisioned becoming a primary care physician because these were the role models I had when growing up in Elizabethtown (Kentucky). But when I got to UCSF, I happened to get involved with and eventually ran the university newspaper (which is a credit to my Centre College liberal arts education). Then somebody said, 'Hey, you’re a pretty good writer, and we’re working on a book for medical education.' I got involved, and that book became a global best seller called First Aid for the USMLE. It’s now the top selling book to prep for the medical boards. That book really changed my life and put me on a trajectory toward medical education." 

To date, Le has authored or edited over 40 textbooks that have been used by nearly 2 million physicians and medical students worldwide.

"ScholarRx, launched in 2004, is a digital curriculum system encompassing what you learn in the first two years of medical school, and we’re working to build out the rest of the clinical training in the next year or two," Le continues. "It goes beyond First Aid, but First Aid content is housed within the ScholarRx platform. On the educator side, we have a whole suite of tools that allow educators to assign curriculum bricks and tools to develop student assessments."

After earning his medical degree at UCSF, Le trained in internal medicine at Yale-New Haven Hospital and completed an allergy and immunology fellowship and a master’s degree in health sciences at Johns Hopkins University. Le returned to Kentucky to join his father's clinical allergy practice and take on a teaching position at the University of Louisville. 

Le has maintained his close relationship to the College, including service on the Board of Trustees, and remembers professors who influenced him in profound ways.

"There are so many. Dr. Bill Levin [Professor Emeritus of Art History] gave me a great appreciation of the arts and humanities. It made me a better physician but also made me a better medical educator. I would also include Mike and Christine Barton [H.W. Stodghill, Jr. and Adele H. Stodghill Professor Emeritus of Biology and Professor Emeritus of Biology, respectively], Peggy Richey [Ewing T. Boles Professor of Biology and Biochemistry & Molecular Biology], and the late Dr. Sagar [Matton Professor Emeritus of Chemistry], who all instilled in me a love and respect for the sciences. I also loved trips to France and Europe with Dr. Charles Vahlkamp [Professor Emeritus of French] and the Galapagos and Ecuador with the Bartons."

In addition to his entrepreneurial pursuits, Le serves on the boards of Centre College and the Hardin Memorial Hospital Foundation.

by Cindy Long