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Rural and Urban Scholars Program

Chronic disease rates are well documented as being higher in
underserved areas. For example, the incidence of heart disease in Athens
County is 52 percent higher than the national average, emphysema is 81
percent higher, and stroke is 33 percent higher. Though every segment
of the population will be affected by the shortage of primary care
physicians, those 20 percent of Americans living in health professional
shortage areas in rural and inner city areas will feel the greatest impact.

“The problems of access in an urban place are different than a rural
place. The context is different. The culture of an inner city is different
from the culture of Appalachia. But the only real way to learn that is to
train in those places,” said Randall Longenecker, M.D., assistant dean
of rural and underserved programs.

The Osteopathic Heritage Foundation’s gift is helping the college
address the urgent need for physicians in underserved areas with the
Rural and Urban Community Scholars programs. Starting in 2013, two
students will be chosen for each track and given a $10,000, four-year
scholarship with the intent of ensuring their commitment to a community
in Ohio. They will be given a personal coach who will help plan their trek
through medical school and will have priority in choosing their CORE
location in an underserved area for their third and fourth years.

Though starting small, the program will grow with the goal of
graduating 16 total students per class. Their training will emphasize the
unique needs of individuals in underserved areas of Ohio, taught through
additional lectures and clinical experiences, with at least six months spent
in a rural or urban underserved setting over the course of medical school.

Changes will also be implemented at the graduate medical education
level. One such change, made possible through the Osteopathic
Heritage Foundation’s gift and the cooperation of CORE partners, is
the development of a new Rural Residency Program. Building on the
CORE’s strong system of rural family medicine residency programs
in Ohio, OU-HCOM will establish a model program at O’Bleness
Memorial Hospital in Athens to provide extensive exposure to the
clinical needs of the underserved rural population in both the outpatient
and inpatient settings of Appalachian Ohio. Residents in this program
will also gain experience in disease management and in procedures
typically unavailable in small, rural hospitals through intermittent
rigorous training experiences in high-volume hospitals in Columbus.

Removing Financial Barriers