Lincoln Memorial University-DeBusk College of Osteopathic Medicine (LMU-DCOM) will celebrate its 2025 Commencement Ceremony on Saturday, May 10, at 10:00 a.m. in Harrogate, Tennessee. The event will honor 367 graduating medical students and marks the culmination of years of rigorous academic and clinical training.
This year’s keynote speaker, Dr. R. Jason Thurman, MD, FAAEM, CPPS, is an esteemed physician leader and educator with a longstanding commitment to graduate medical education and patient safety. Thurman earned his medical degree from the University of Alabama in 1998 and went on to complete his emergency medicine residency at the University of Cincinnati in 2002. After finishing his training, he joined the Vanderbilt Department of Emergency Medicine, where he spent 13 years in leadership roles, including Assistant and Associate Director of the Emergency Medicine Residency Program and Associate Medical Director of the Vanderbilt Stroke Center.
During his time at Vanderbilt, Thurman also served as Director of Quality and Patient Safety for the department for eight years and led its Morbidity and Mortality Conference for 12 years. In 2015, he became Chief Medical Officer at Skyline Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee, a position he held for six years. He currently serves as Vice President for Graduate Medical Education at Community Health Systems, where he continues to focus on resident training and institutional oversight.
Thurman’s professional passions include resident education, acute stroke care, quality improvement, patient safety and fostering a culture of professionalism and advocacy. He is also a longtime medical photographer and has published two medical textbooks, contributed to several book chapters, and authored numerous peer-reviewed articles. For the past 15 years, he has chaired the medical photography exhibit at the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine’s national conference.
The commencement ceremony will celebrate the achievements of LMU-DCOM’s Class of 2025, who are now prepared to enter residency programs and begin careers as osteopathic physicians serving communities across the nation.
The DeBusk College of Osteopathic Medicine is located on the campus of Lincoln Memorial University in Harrogate, Tennessee, at LMU-Knoxville in Knoxville, Tennessee, and at LMU-DCOM in Orange Park, Florida. LMU-DCOM is an integral part of LMU’s values-based learning community and is dedicated to preparing the next generation of osteopathic physicians to provide health care in the often-underserved region of Appalachia and beyond. For more information about LMU-DCOM, call 1.800.325.0900, ext. 7082, email dcom@LMUnet.edu, or visit us online at http://med.LMUnet.edu.
