The MSU Family Medicine Residency Program Network sponsors an elective to introduce medical students to individual family doctors and provide them with a unique three-day experience. This includes the opportunity to spend three full days and nights with a family doctor and his/her family during the summer. Students receive one elective credit and their mileage expenses are reimbursed. Students completing the experience find it extremely rewarding.
By Dexter Fossitt
MSU Medical Student
July 31, 2008
 My three days were spent with Donald R. Ellis III, MD, of Oscoda. I arrived at Dr. Ellis’s house on July 27, 2008, and was greeted by a slew of people. Eleven of his family members were just getting ready for dinner. That night I was introduced to his wife, children, parents, sister, and sister’s children. Afterwards I was given a tour of his house, while everyone else was leaving. That night we talked at length about his experiences working in a rural area and he gave me an opportunity to voice my thoughts and beliefs about becoming a family physician.
The next three days amounted to a great learning experience. During the morning of the first day we saw patients in the hospital. Three of the patients were having COPD exacerbations and the other had inflammatory breast cancer. My past experiences with family medicine gave me the impression that family physicians only treated basic issues and mainly referred patients to specialists for any complicated issue. This experience shot that belief down.
 After our stint at the hospital we went to the outpatient clinic and saw patients there for the next 2.5 days. St. Joseph's Oscoda Health Park where Dr. Ellis practices provides comprehensive care to the people of northern Iosco and Alcona Counties. Oscoda and the surrounding towns are located directly on Lake Huron and are mainly resort towns. The population consists predominately of elderly people who have multiple co-existing chronic diseases. We only saw a few pediatric patients. I didn’t really consider this a big factor in my future career, but it really is. Matching my interests with the population I will be taking care of will be a large factor in deciding my residency location and ultimately where I practice as an attending physician.
We saw so many interesting cases in the clinic that reinforced what I learned during my first year of medical school. We saw one older woman treated recently with aminoglycoside antibiotics who had new onset hearing loss. We saw a pregnant woman with pruritic urticarial papules and plaques of pregnancy (PUPPP), which is an itchy rash occurring in about 1 in every 200 pregnancies. We saw a baby with elevated bilirubin and determined that she was possibly having a mild hemolytic response instead of physiologic jaundice.
In addition to clinical activities, Dr. Ellis gave me a lot of information about billing properly, maintaining good relationships with the other staff and how to boost their morale, and even of the importance of practicing evidence-based medicine.
Dr. Ellis was a great example of a physician who could maintain a happy home life and a rewarding practice simultaneously. At work he was an excellent clinician who seemed to be this guru of nearly every area of medicine. Dr. Ellis had such a great relationship with his patients and had known many of them ever since he started practicing 8 years ago. When we left the office his focus seemed to change completely to his family. He would play with his three young children and spend time with his wife.
Becoming a family physician was at the top of my list and this experience just strengthened that. In particular, I want to work in a rural area in both the inpatient and outpatient settings. Overall this experience cleared up all of my preconceptions about family medicine and showed me the true scope of specialty.
Reprinted by permission from Mr. Fossitt.
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For either students or hosts to apply, contact Kay Backus, Educational Program Coordinator, MSU Department of Family Practice, B106 Clinical Center, MSU Campus, (517) 884-0454, backus@msu.edu. For questions about the program, call Marolee Neuberger, MS, Residency Network Director, MSU Department of Family Medicine, B-120 Clinical Center, MSU Campus, (517) 884-0439, Marolee.Neuberger@hc.msu.edu.
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