MSU medical school to partner with northern Michigan hospital

Michigan State University’s College of Human Medicine will be partnering with the Munson Healthcare Cadillac Hospital in northern Michigan.

“This is a great opportunity for our medical students to be able to train directly in our rural setting,” David Klee, the community assistant campus dean for the Traverse City campus said.

The partnership is part of a program to train medical students in a real-life setting. Medical students study on campus for their first two years and then take their third and fourth year to do rotations in one of eight of the college’s medical clinics throughout Michigan. Other rural settings include Ludington, Charlevoix, Grayling, Alpena and Cadillac.

Klee said that along with getting hands-on experience, students have the opportunity to meet with officials in the hospital and city to talk about the different ways students can engage with the community. Students will also receive a Rural Community Health certificate.

“The goal is to get (students) to understand how wonderful our rural communities are,” Klee said. “When they go off to residency, they’ll come back and practice in our rural communities.”

The college already brought one student to Cadillac this past summer. Britton Michmerhuizen is a college student who is spending his third year in Cadillac doing his rotations, according to an MSU press release.

Klee said the college is looking to base two to four third-year students in Cadillac in the future.