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Montanans deserve world-class healthcare – Daily Montanan

['More From Author', 'May', 'Guest Commentary']

Date: 2022-05-31 00:00:00

In June, we will graduate from Montana’s medical school and begin our careers as resident-physicians in training. For the past 50 years, WWAMI, Montana’s public medical school partnership, has been growing the next generation of physicians to serve local communities. We want all Montanans to take pride in this homegrown approach and say thank you for your support.

The WWAMI program is a four-year medical school right here in Montana operated through a partnership between Montana State University and the top-ranked University of Washington School of Medicine. The acronym stands for the five states that make up the collective program – Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana and Idaho. Montana WWAMI admits 30 students per year, most of whom are like us – born and raised right here in Montana with commitments to return to the state to practice medicine. The program also prioritizes students who plan to practice primary care and even designates nearly half of each entering class to a rural medicine track.

One of the strengths of the program is its connection with the University of Washington, which is ranked No. 1 in the nation for both primary care and family medicine education. As Montana WWAMI students, we train in both Montana and Seattle, bringing back the academic rigor of UW to our hometowns and throughout the state.

Because of the academic strength of Montana WWAMI, we are well poised to take residency positions at some of the most well-respected training programs in our chosen specialties. And after residency, which is three to seven years of mandatory training after medical school for new physicians, we are planning to return to our home state to practice.

The quality of medical training in and for Montana matters. The residents training now will be caring for our communities, our children, our parents and will relieve current doctors caring for our state. Montana might be rural and small in population, but we all deserve access to world-class health care. And WWAMI delivers.

As a public medical school, Montana WWAMI is not motivated by profit or other interests, and its students, like us, have a track record of becoming in-state physician leaders for the past 50 years. New private or for-profit medical schools may bring in more medical students, most of them from out of state, but they are unlikely to return to practice in Montana after having to do their clinical training elsewhere. Students in these new programs will have significantly more debt than Montana WWAMI grads, which matters as our state’s cost of living continues to climb.

WWAMI focuses thoughtfully on quality before quantity. The mission is providing sustainable, top-notch medical training to future Montana physicians. The WWAMI program is simply unbeatable in quality, mission and service to Montana. And it’s made up of Montanans, like us, planning to be your future physicians. The program has been diligently serving our state for 50 years, for that we say thank you, and let’s support and grow Montana’s medical school for the next 50 and beyond.

The following authors have written this commentary:

Brooke Parker, Psychiatry (Anaconda)

Morgan Julian, Family Medicine (Billings)

Emma Fulton, Vascular Surgery (Billings)

Madison Schwarzkoph, Obstetrics & Gynecology (Billings)

Joey Werner, Emergency Medicine (Billings)

Samantha Kropp, Neurology (Billings/Red Lodge)

Darian Schafer, Emergency Medicine (Billings)

Danielle Guyer, Family Medicine (Billings)

Marie Elwood, Family Medicine (Billings)

Sam Forrest, Family Medicine (Bozeman)

Katie Hawkins, Internal Medicine (Dillon)

Kristen White, Family Medicine/Obstetrics (Ennis)

Robin Byron, Internal Medicine (Hardin)

Quin Stevens, Emergency Medicine (Kalispell)

MaKenna Stavins, Internal Medicine & Primary Care (Kalispell)

Ethan Bent, Radiology (Lewistown)

Kiera Bulluck, Internal Medicine (Lewistown)

Joel Kramer, General Surgery (Missoula)

Kyle Malek, Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation (Missoula)

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