A new medical student will, if all goes according to plan, become a doctor in four years thanks to the Dr. L.D. Britt Scholarship.

Lawrence Brundidge received the scholarship from Britt, a Suffolk native, during last week’s scholarship dinner at the Norfolk Waterside Marriott.

“It was a great event,” Britt said of the dinner, which had about 500 attendees. “We had people that wanted tickets, but we just sold out.”

Britt said people in the community, including some on whom he had operated, started the scholarship fund, because they wanted to do something to honor him.

Britt is a graduate of Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health. He is professor and chairman of the Department of Surgery at Eastern Virginia Medical School and holds the Brickhouse Chair in Surgery.

He’s the first black person in the country to have an endowed chair in surgery and the first black person in Virginia to be appointed professor of surgery.

Brundidge, Britt said, will attend medical school at the University of Virginia.

A new scholarship has been given every year for 20 years.

“At any given time, we have four Britt scholars from this community initiative in medical school,” Britt said. “It’s something that’s been needed.”

Britt said it is important to help deserving minority students attend medical school.

“We have a workforce shortage, and we have a diversity shortage,” he said. “Someone from a diverse background is more likely to go back to a diverse community. If we did not have disparities in health care, lives would be saved.”

In addition to presenting the scholarship to Brundidge, Britt presented the 2011 Britt scholar, Dr. Shannon Walker, as the keynote speaker.

“She just gave her reflections, and she did a marvelous job,” Britt said.

Walker graduated from Princeton University and continued her studies at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, where she graduated with honors this spring in the Alpha Omega Alpha honor society.

“Shannon Walker is the embodiment of what it’s all about,” Britt said. “She was very thankful of having the scholarship.”