MOULTRIE, Ga. — Fifty-nine osteopathic medical students just took the next step in their journey by officially donning their white coats for the first time. They are the PCOM South Georgia Class of 2023 — the inaugural class.

The White Coat Ceremony was held on the PCOM South Georgia campus at 10 a.m. Friday. It symbolizes the students’ acceptance into the community of physicians, according to Chief Academic Officer Michael Sampson, D.O., F.A.O.S.M.

“It kind of solidifies them that they’re in medical school — that what they’re trying to attain is to become a physician at the end,” he said. “I like it because it’s just one more part of the medical school experience.”

This isn’t the first time the students wore their white coats. As the inaugural class, they received their white coats before school began and wore them for press and public appearances at events.

Next year’s class won’t get the same treatment; however, the white coat ceremony will run as it did this year with teamwork as a central theme.

“Some people thought that it’d be better for a physician to put each one of their jackets on,” Sampson said. “We want to keep that separate for graduation.”

The teamwork aspect of the ceremony involved each of the student doctors helping their classmates in putting on their white coat. But it also referenced that in their future, someone else will always be in their hands.

Jessica Brumfield-Mitcham, D.O., PCOM Class of ’15, who finished her family medicine residency at the Georgia South Family Medicine Residency Program and practices in Moultrie, addressed that very notion.

Donning the white coat is a heavy weight of responsibility, she said.

“Practicing medicine can be stressful. It’s very demanding and requires you to put your patients first,” she said. “There will be times when you are faced with giving the grave diagnosis that a patient fears the most. You will share in the sorrow of a family member as you hug them and tell them their loved one has passed away.”

But one cannot stop from feelings of defeat, the burden of an ever-growing list of patients to treat or save, of the frustration of never having enough time.

“All of these things will weigh you down,” she said. “However, you must be resilient, which is defined by the ability to withstand or recover quickly from difficult situations. You must learn to work hard for the sake of your patients while also learning to take care of yourself.”

She left those sentiments with the future doctors of America and, potentially, south Georgia — with students she sees herself in. It wasn’t too long ago that she was in their seats, albeit at a different campus.

“It’s just kind of crazy to look back and say ‘Man, that was me,’” she said referencing a sense of naivete. “I think they’re going to be fine. It’s just one of those things you don’t know until you’re in it.”

Xavia Taylor, a student doctor from Moultrie, sees her pathway in a similar light. Much like the rest of her classmates, she knows the white coat is a promise to the future.

“One day we’ll hold the lives of others in our hands and I feel like that alone is a perfect career,” she said.

Her white coat may be clean now, but it won’t stay that way on the long road ahead.

“[It] symbolizes the promise that we make to our patients, what we will do for our community, [and] the oath that we took when we first started here at PCOM,” Taylor said.

Of course, regular washes will be necessary for hygiene and professionalism.

Before donning the white coats, the students took 10 weeks of classes (their first term), which included principles of osteopathic medicine, which covers a host of topics including anatomy, physiology, radiology and more, and osteopathic manipulative medicine where they learned about body structure and its effects on overall health.

The 59 students include people from many different locations. Several are from south Georgia.

PCOM South Georgia itself is a part of an initiative to decrease the national deficit of doctors and increase south Georgia’s number of physicians. And all eyes are on the Class of 2023, Sampson said.

“What south Georgia wanted is physicians growing in my ‘hashtag’ hometown medical school,” he said. “They’re the future of rural Georgia for physicians — the pipeline.”