(upbeat music)
- [Female Speaker] Here at UC Davis,
we have this incredible social mission.
We create the physicians that California needs.
- We have accelerated programs
that are designed to produce
exceedingly well-trained primary care physicians
who have a commitment to the communities
from whence they came.
- The track programs create a place where the students
have a continual connection to their home community.
We bring in the students who are from a community
that really needs them, where they wanna go back and work.
We sort of think of them as spending
their formative time here.
We give them the skills they need to then go back
and work in that community.
- When I first learned about UC Davis,
I just thought, "Wow, how neat is it
that a medical school is so interested in
the health disparities in Central Valley,
and the lack of healthcare access there".
That they want to, you know, partner in this program
to grow, essentially, their own Central Valley providers.
- When my family transitioned to America,
and we settled down in Bakersfield,
I started the ED, and hearing stories
that families have to go to UCLA,
or go to
UCFS,
or UC Davis,
outside of Bakersfield.
Why was this?
We came here to America,
one, for better access to care.
- Growing up, my family and I didn't know
about what primary care was.
And so I think that my experience of not having that
and seeing how much it impacted my family
and my community, really drove me to want
to be a part of that solution some way.
(foreign language)
- It was really hard to find a doctor that spoke Spanish,
and I saw that as an issue as I was growing up
here in California.
- (mumbles) changes are typically right.
- [Male Doctor] Correct, correct.
- [Female Speaker] Students come in
with just a wide array of talents.
So we have this ability to identify their talents,
and then create different types of opportunities
for them as they go through.
- So yeah, you're feeling for crepitus.
That's the popping. - Little bit of popping here.
- A rural site is just you and the doctor,
and that way you're able to get
one on one teaching, you get a lot more hands on,
a lot more attention.
- There's this understanding from the get-go
that you're committed to primary care
and everyone around you is committed
to training you to be a primary care provider.
- They're eager to teach
and they wanna have you there.
You show up, and you know you have a place,
and you know you have a role,
and you know you have your patients.
- We're partnered with
an attending, from the first week that we're in the program,
and we essentially stay with them through the three years
in our outpatient clinic.
So they really get to know us, we get to know them.
- We have collaborated with Kaiser Permanente
and with funding from the AMA
to create this three year primary care program.
And in California, primary care is one of
the biggest physician shortages in the state.
So, if we can train students to do primary care,
to then enter the primary care workforce a year earlier,
to markedly reduce their debt.
- This is what this program is for, you know.
It's for students like me that know they wanna do it
and just wanna get it done.
- [Tyler] Going back to my community,
I think it was both refreshing and empowering.
- Truly, that's where I think my commitment was,
is in helping these communities be able
to get the care that they need.
- I think this program is a very intentional nod
towards the future of medical education.
- There's more than one way to get into medicine,
and there's more than one way to finish medicine.
- If you know in your heart that primary care
is what you wanna do,
there's really no other program,
that, in my opinion, is better than this.
- And even though it's hard as I'm doing it,
and there are days where I'm questioning my sanity
as to how hard this is, I don't see myself
doing anything else, and I definitely don't regret it.