Above: Dr. Roger Garrison, associate director of graduate medical education, addresses the 26 newly coated doctors who will spend between three and seven years in their residencies at RUHS Medical Center.

Moreno Valley, Ca. — Dozens of brand new doctors began their first day on the job Monday at Riverside University Health System—Medical Center, where they will spend the next three to seven years training in their specialized fields of medicine.

The doctors are recent graduates from medical schools across the country. They hit the ground running after last week’s orientation and white coat ceremony, where each doctor was ‘coated’ with the long white jacket that has become a symbol of trust and professionalism.

“Take care of yourself. Take care of each other. The days will be long and the years will be short,” Dr. Roger Garrison, associate director of graduate medical education told the 26 new physicians during the White Coat Ceremony.

Senior resident physicians also shared sage advice with their junior colleagues. They encouraged them to take time to care for themselves, forge strong bonds with their cohorts and to take the time to know their patients.

“Medicine is very humbling, and it is so inspiring to learn about that patient who has been a husband for 60 years,” said Dr. Tony Hu, senior resident in RUHS’ anesthesiology residency program. “Your choice to train at a county hospital speaks to your dedication and selflessness.”

For more than a century, RUHS has served as Riverside County’s primary public teaching and safety net hospital as part of its mission to serve the healthcare needs of the nation’s tenth most populous county.

In all, RUHS sponsors five physician residency programs: Anesthesiology, General Surgery, Neurosurgery, Orthopedic Surgery and Family Medicine, the oldest accredited family medicine program in California dating back to 1971. Collectively, RUHS residency programs support a total of 116 fulltime medical residents each year. But training doctors in a region that has only half of the physicians it needs doesn’t stop there.

Over the next year, more than 1,000 physician residents and medical students will perform clinical rotations at RUHS Medical Center through academic affiliations with schools of medicine at UC Riverside, Loma Linda and Western University. RUHS is also expanding medical education to include physician extenders such as clinical pharmacists.

In 2016 RUHS launched its Clinical Pharmacy program, where pharmacists are trained as physician extenders and play active roles in caring for patients throughout the medical center and clinics. Additionally, more than 2,000 registered nursing students and allied health professionals will be trained at RUHS this year through numerous affiliations with colleges and universities across Southern California.