Mayo Alumni Magazine 2006 Winter - MC4409-0106 - Mayo Clinic

To know Scott Litin, M.D., is to
know laughter.
Dr. Litin, the new president of the
Mayo Clinic Alumni Association, has
distinguished himself as a Mayo Clinic
specialist in internal medicine and as a
mentor and teacher of young physicians
and students. But perhaps he is best
known for his sense of humor, which
helps people feel at ease in a variety of
situations.
“I was a member of the second
class of the Mayo Medical School,”says
Dr. Litin.“And I tell people that I’ve
been second class ever since.”
Dr. Litin uses humor to help
patients feel at ease. He also makes use
of it when conveying messages to his
colleagues. He and Edward Creagan,
M.D., (Oncology ’77, Internal Medicine
‘75), developed the first program in
which clinicians teach other clinicians
the art of public speaking. It is a
required course for third-year Mayo
Medical School students and is a
course that has been sought out by
many other physician organizations
and professional groups. One of the
key messages includes how best to use
humor in a presentation.“The most
effective humor that will endear you to
an audience should be self-deprecating
humor,”Litin says.
It’s one of many lessons Dr. Litin
learned from his father, Edward Litin,
M.D., an early member of Mayo Clinic’s
Department of Psychiatry, who later
served as chair of that department.
“My first role model was my father,
who was known at Mayo as a very
humorous person. He was friendly,
outgoing, and extremely helpful to
both patients and colleagues,”he says.
“I’ve tried to pattern myself after him
by being very attentive to helping my
patients and colleagues, and having fun
while doing so.”
Winter 2006 Mayo Alumni 19