Mercer University School of Medicine Announces Latest Class of Primary Care Accelerated Track Scholars
Tuesday, July 28th, 2020
Mercer University School of Medicine (MUSM) recently announced its latest class of Primary Care Accelerated Track (ACT) Scholars.
The Primary Care ACT Program allows students interested in a career in family medicine, general internal medicine or pediatrics to have the opportunity to complete their medical school coursework in an accelerated three-year program of study.
Scholarships are awarded to highly-qualified medical students upon the completion of their first year of medical school and cover tuition for the second and third years. These students must be in good academic standing and have a strong desire to practice primary care in a rural area.
Upon completion of residency, Scholars are required to participate in three years of continuous, full-time, primary care medical practice in a rural area of Georgia. The practice must also accept Medicaid patients.
“This is an outstanding program that enables qualified students to accelerate their education, decrease their debt and enter the workforce sooner without sacrificing quality,” said Jean R. Sumner, M.D., dean of MUSM. “This program wouldn’t be possible without the strong support and leadership of Georgia’s state legislature and governor.”
This year’s class of Primary Care ACT Scholars includes:
Macon Campus:
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Kara Kelsey, from McIntyre, specializing in family medicine
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Yoonhee Kim, from Watkinsville, specializing in family medicine
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Weston Cody King, from Albany, specializing in internal medicine
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Kyle Posey, from Ocilla, specializing in family medicine
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Nelliena Young, from Albany, specializing in pediatrics
Savannah Campus:
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Caitlin Balno, from Savannah, specializing in family medicine
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Jana Byrd, from Dawsonville, specializing in internal medicine
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Austin Browning, from Adrian, specializing in internal medicine
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Alyssa Fernando, from Baxley, specializing in internal medicine
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Evan Graham, from Decatur, specializing in internal medicine
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Savannah Grunhard, from Covington, specializing in internal medicine
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Kristen Prather Stovall, from Augusta, specializing in family medicine
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Sydney Voorhees, from Dahlonega, specializing in pediatrics
The Primary Care ACT Program builds upon the strengths of MUSM’s problem-based curriculum with clinical experiences and community medicine activities built into the preclinical years and reinforced through continued longitudinal clinical experiences at the ACT site, clerkships, sub-internships and elective experiences.
Mercer’s primary care accelerated curriculum track was one of the first programs of its kind in the United States. The innovative curriculum compresses the educational objectives of the four-year M.D. program into 130 weeks of instructional time that culminates in a medical degree and prepares students for early entry into a traditional primary care residency.