ST. LOUIS – Missouri is getting millions of dollars to help combat the doctor shortage in rural areas.
Dr. Kathleen Quinn leads the Rural Scholars Program at the University of Missouri School of Medicine. The program encourages students from rural areas of the state to pursue medical school.
A $16 million grant will help fund scholarships for students accepted into the program. Since it started nearly three decades ago, about 50% of students are now practicing physicians in rural communities in the state.
Then you get a health care provider and then a business will come into that town because there’s a provider. Every physician in a rural community brings in about $1.3 million of revenue for the town.
The grant money will also be used to expose students to healthcare careers through the school of medicine’s mobile training facility, which has life-like patient simulators.
