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April 6, 2006

Regional programs key to top ranking

UW Health Sciences/UW Medicine

Doug Plummer
Gary Schillhammer, a clinician who has worked with medical students for a long time in Darrington, removes a cast from the ankle of 2-year-old Kole Janowski, while Kole’s mother, Jennifer, looks on. Schillhammer is one of many physicians who work with students in small towns and rural sites in Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana and Idaho. They are seen as an important part of the school’s success in primary care training.

The School of Medicine’s top ranking in primary-care training and in its teaching programs in family medicine and in rural health are clearly related to the strength of regional programs and training sites, medical school leaders said.

The UW School of Medicine serves as a medical school for the states of Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, and Idaho through the WWAMI program, an acronym for the participating states.

The school has teaching sites for medical students in more than 100 towns and cities across the five-state region. Five state universities, and more than 4,500 volunteer physicians and other clinicians in the region, join in educating and training UW medical students.

“The work of these clinicians in training medical students to care for a variety of patient conditions in a community setting is a key reason for the UW School of Medicine’s outstanding reputation in teaching primary-care, family medicine, rural health, and other generalist fields,” said Dr. Paul G. Ramsey, dean of the School of Medicine and vice president for medical affairs at the UW.

Like other medical schools across the nation, the UW School of Medicine is facing the challenge of declining student interest in primary care. The decline has been partially attributed to the regulatory burdens primary-care physicians face in their practices. According to a UW study published earlier this month in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the growing shortage of primary-care physicians is further diminishing the nation’s ability to care for the poor and uninsured or for people living in rural areas. About 35 percent of the people in the WWAMI region reside in rural areas. The UW School of Medicine is looking at a number of new approaches to encourage more medical students to enter primary-care training

“Educating primary-care physicians is a key part of our mission, and we are developing new ways to increase our effectiveness in this area,” said Dr. Thomas E. Norris, vice dean for academic affairs at the UW School of Medicine, who heads the school’s programs for medical students.