BENAVIDES AWARD GOES TO TOP MEDICAL STUDENT
FORT WORTH, Texas -- Germany native Barbara Webster will be named the 1999 recipient of the Leo Benavides Memorial Award of the Tarrant County Medical Society at the weekly meeting of the Rotary Club of Fort Worth, held at the Fort Worth Club at 306 West 7th St. on Friday, June 4 at noon.
stablished in 1997, the award is given annually to a graduating senior at the UNT Health Science Center’s Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine (TCOM) and recognizes academic achievements, service to the community and model medical students.
Graduating in the top 10 percent of her class, Webster will receive her Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine degree on Saturday, June 5 from the health science center’s medical school.
Webster, 39, is a wife, a mother of two and was trained to be an architect in Germany, but came to America to pursue her dream of working in medicine. She hopes to work as an OB/GYN after completing her post-graduate residency training at John Peter Smith Hospital in Fort Worth.
"Webster has transposed herself to American culture to follow her dream," said Gene Deutscher, a member of the awards selection committee. "She best exemplifies the spirit in which the award is given."
The award is named in memory of the Tarrant County Medical Society’s late executive director, Leo Benavides, who was killed in an auto accident in 1993. The society is composed of over 2,000 practicing physicians and medical students.
The UNT Health Science Center operates TCOM as well as the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences and programs in Public Health and Physician Assistant Studies. The center’s research initiatives are conducted in its six Institutes for Discovery. The medical school faculty staffs Tarrant County’s largest multispecialty group, the Physicians & Surgeons Medical Group.