School of Medicine Strategic Priority
Clinton
Advance the West Campus as a model interprofessional educational hub with a unique rural community commitment
Transformation in the west: How a community hospital became a hub of rural care research, learning and opportunity By many measures, Lewistown is idyllic. It’s a rural community with easy access to the picturesque Juniata River and plenty of boating and fishing. It’s a small town where neighbors know one another and have been friends for generations. However, Lewistown is also not immune to the issues that plague such communities. Because it is so representative of rural and small-town America — in both its blessings and its challenges — Lewistown could be a laboratory for analyzing and solving the health disparity issues faced by similar communities nationwide. And now it is. Thanks to a convergence of healthcare, academia and research at Geisinger, Lewistown is a growing hub of discovery and learning.
advantage of Geisinger’s practice model. We’re very fortunate to have that constellation of factors come together.” The “constellation” has, since 2013, shown results: •
In 2018, the Lewistown Family Medicine Residency Program, a collaborative effort between Geisinger and the Family Practice Center, was established with a substantial grant from the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA).
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In 2020, the Geisinger Lewistown Hospital Pharmacy Residency welcomed its first cohort of residents.
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In 2022, the first cohort of Geisinger Commonwealth medical students arrived at the newly launched West Campus.
Mifflin
Lewistown Ju
Lewistown’s community hospital has always been a gem, delivering basic services the surrounding area needed. The hospital also had its own diplomagranting nursing school. But when it was acquired in 2013 by Geisinger, the depth and breadth of services dramatically increased. Education leaders recognized they had an unusual opportunity. “Speaking from experience, it’s very hard to mount a medical student education program in a rural community hospital because of the accreditation requirements and the need for a coverage of a wide array of services,” said Geisinger College Provost and Vice Dean for Education William Jeffries, PhD. “With Geisinger, we have the ability to cover all the essentials — but the population is also uniquely rural and so we have the added opportunity to take
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In 2023, the Geisinger Lewistown Hospital School of Nursing dipolma program closed and the Geisinger School of Nursing opened, which offers an associate degree in nursing. To house the new school, the Geisinger College of Health Sciences began renovating a large property in the heart of Lewistown.
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In 2023, Geisinger also received two new HRSA grants: one for a first-of-its-kind in the Commonwealth residency program in preventive medicine and another for a Clinical Faculty and Preceptor Academy to enhance teaching skills of nursing faculty in the midAtlantic region.
