MEET LOCAL LEGEND: Diane D. Homan, M.D.

BIOGRAPHY

“My being a physician is a gift,” says Diane Homan who, like the other female members of her traditional agrarian Pennsylvania sect, was expected to become a "subservient farmer's wife." “I had the understanding and support of my family—the stability to take advantage of the gift,” she says. “So my advice is to identify your dream and never give up!”

“Helping others” has been Homan's guiding principle throughout her life in medicine, first as a "candy striper" at the local hospital, then while caring for the elderly in a community nursing home and then as a critical care nurse after college. During her nursing career, she established the first dialysis center in northern Indiana as well as the first neonatal program at the hospital where she worked. It was at this time she decided to leave nursing to realize her dream of becoming a doctor so she could give even more of herself to those in need.

Today, she is Assistant Vice President of Medical Affairs at Rush–Copley Medical Center, in Aurora, as well as founder and Program Director of the Center's Family Practice Residency Program. J. Dennis Hastert [R–IL–14], Speaker of the House of Representatives and her Local Legends sponsor, considers her a “truly distinctive woman and unsung heroine.”

As the only one of its kind in the Fox Valley area, the Family Practice Residency Program brings the quality health care resources of Rush University to the under–served minority populations of Aurora and surrounding communities, especially the working poor. In particular, Homan focuses on helping mothers and their children. The program exposes resident physicians to practicing medicine in a diverse community, deepening their knowledge and compassion.

One of her goals is to teach residents the rewards of taking care of people with special needs, whether they are from a specific ethnic group and cannot communicate well in English, have a certain disease such as HIV—AIDs, or are personally or financially vulnerable. In addition to believing and teaching that every family physician should contribute to the communities they practice in, she makes it her mission to show them. That is why, for example, she developed "Changes," an eight–week educational program for pregnant teens that includes prenatal information, baby care and what Homan calls "life care." Changes also encourages girls to finish high school.

In addition to maintaining her own family medicine practice for more than twenty years, Homan has provided clinical care and leadership at Advocate–Christ Medical Center and the Illinois Masonic Medical Center. In her private practice, she provides the entire spectrum of health care including obstetrics. In addition, she collaborates with the Kane County Health Department to identify women who are victims of domestic violence around the time of pregnancy, and works with the Visiting Nurse Association of Kane County, providing follow–up and treatment for women with abnormal cervical examinations.

A member of the Illinois Academy of Family Physicians, she was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Family Physicians in 1990. Among her many awards, Homan was 2002 Faculty Member of the Year, Spirit of Nursing at Rush–Copley Medical Center.