NEWPORT – Three new doctors will get a deep dive into the demands of rural health care over the next two years through Samaritan Health Services’ family medicine rural residency program based in Newport.
The program’s goal is to create well-trained physicians specializing in family medicine with a focus on caring for an underserved, rural population. A secondary goal is to show the new doctors the opportunities available to them on the central Oregon coast and perhaps inspire them to remain.
The first medical residents are:
- Alec Boike, who earned his medical degree from the University of Minnesota Medical School in Minneapolis;
- Amro Elgeziry, who earned his medical degree from Ain Shams University in Cairo, Egypt.
- Eric Rice, who earned his medical degree from Western University of Health Sciences College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific-Northwest in Lebanon.
Samaritan Health Services received two grants totaling $1.2 million to develop the coastal program. The grants were from the Oregon Health Authority and the U.S. Health Resources & Services Administration.
A residency program is a post-graduate program for physicians required to obtain an unrestricted license to practice medicine. Residents work alongside an attending physician, seeing patients in a variety of settings. Once they graduate, they may affiliate with the hospital where they trained or choose to go elsewhere.
“We believe this program will allow us to grow our own physicians, so to speak,” Dr. Lesley Ogden, chief executive officer of the two Samaritan hospitals in Lincoln County, said in a news release announcing the doctors’ arrival. “After they spend two years treating patients here, becoming involved in the community and exploring everything wonderful about the Oregon coast, we hope they will want to build their practices locally and make this their home.”
The three doctors spent the first year of the program primarily at Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center in Corvallis, learning the Samaritan hospital system and building on the medical diagnostic and clinical skills they learned in medical school. The next two years will be spent at Samaritan Pacific Communities Hospital in Newport and clinics in Lincoln County, as well as long-term care facilities, tribal clinics and other settings.
“We are eager to experience the positive impacts that this residency will bring to the community and to see how the community shapes the future medical leaders that we’re developing,” said Ogden.
The three doctors said their welcome by hospital staff and work so far on the coast has been good.
“Everyone, from the hospital faculty and staff to the patients themselves, has been incredibly receptive and welcoming,” Boike said in the news release announcing their arrival. “The privilege to provide health care to an underserved rural population comes with a lot of responsibilities, but it has been so rewarding to be able to serve the coastal population and help provide access to care.”
“I feel grateful to be part of the program,”Elgeziry said. “It has been a wonderful learning experience and a privilege to serve this community.”
“Co-workers have been so flexible and eager to teach and incorporate us into the teams here,” Rice said.
Awesome development. My gratitude is huge and sincere. Thank you to Dr. Ogden and everyone else who contributed to this project. Apart from our wonderful coastal community of people and nature, is salary. Since 2015, both my endocrinologist and primary care physician left the coast. I moved my medical care to Portland. Both physicians said the sole reason for leaving is that Samaritan’s salaries were higher in Corvallis. Dr. Ogden, were salary and other benefits higher in the valley eight years ago? Is this true now? Thank you.