The Med Bunch

The cadaver bone and five screws in Tyson Bolinske’s right shoulder are very likely the reasons he’s beginning medical school this fall.  They were put there six years ago by a UND M.D. graduate who so impressed him that he began to consider medicine as a career choice.

Back in high school at Dickinson, ND, Bolinske had sustained a few injuries playing football and, as a patient of Troy Pierce, M.D. ’91,

Bismarck, remembers well the young surgeon and his impact.

“His whole presentation, his confidence and skill level, his straightforwardness – everything combined, the total package” was impressive, he recalls.  “He said he hadn’t done this particular

surgery before, that I could go to (elsewhere), but that he believed he could do it.”

Bolinske told him to go ahead.

“He cut a divot in my shoulder; made a wedge of a cadaver bone” and secured it all with screws.  Today, “the shoulder is stronger than ever.”

All the physicians Bolinske met as a patient were UND grads and, he thought, “these are all doctors from North Dakota, they attended UND; look how good they are!”

Bolinske is the son of Shelly Bolinske of Dickinson and Larry Bolinske of Eagan, MN.  He earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from UND in May 2007.

The son of Gerald and Cherylyn Ericson of Hatton, ND, had just earned a bachelor’s degree in biology at UND in 2005 when he started working at Mayo in the Blood Transfusion, Coagulation and

Cardiopulmonary Bypass Research Group where Mark Ereth, M.D. ‘85, is one of a team of three who heads up the unit.

That experience, combined with Ereth’s mentorship, convinced Ericson to pursue medicine.  Although he applied to a half-dozen

schools in the Midwest, “UND was my first choice,” he said.  And “the curriculum is the main reason.”

He is excited to study medicine through the patient-centered learning which “integrates clinical sciences with the basic sciences, along with problem-solving.”

“To be a good physician, you have to know more than just the basic science. You need to know how to apply it to real-life situations,” he says, which students start doing from the first day and continue throughout medical school.

“The more practice you have at something, the better off you’re going to be.”

Growing up in Beulah, ND, Matthew Gerde recalls being fascinated by medical dramas on TV, replete with all-too-realistic surgeries and sometimes gruesome emergency room scenes.

“I am the only one in my family who can watch that stuff without getting grossed out,” says the son of Mark and Arlette Gerde, Beulah.

The idea of becoming a physician “has always been in the back of my mind,” he says, but his experience as an EMT (emergency medical technician) for the Mercer County Ambulance Service about two years ago was “a deciding factor.”

He also was influenced by long-time Bismarck pediatrician, William Riecke, M.D. (B.S. Med. ’57), who was his doctor for years.  “He’s a great guy.  He perked my interest in medicine in the first place.” (Riecke has since relocated to North Carolina.)

UND “was always my first choice,” he says, largely due to its “very good reputation – it’s as good or better than anywhere else.”

He expects to be able to incorporate knowledge, gained through earning the Bachelor of Science in computer science this spring at Minot State University, into his future medical practice.

“It’s still hard to believe I’m going to medical school,” he says. “I’m really looking forward to it.  I really feel very honored to be selected.”

“Medicine is my passion in life,” says Fallon Hoverson.  “Passion produces purpose, and I feel it’s my purpose to pursue a career in

medicine.”  (Her sister Alyssa Hoverson, M.D. ’05, shares the same passion.)

The daughter of Deborah Hoverson, Manvel, ND, and Carl Hoverson, Larimore, ND, earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology at UND this past spring.  She applied to other medical schools “but UND was definitely my top pick.

“UND’s focus on patient-centered learning allows students to interact with patients early on and to build skills that will help them become talented and personable physicians,” she notes.  The curriculum “makes for compassionate physicians; patients know they can trust you and relate to you.”

Faculty members “seem genuinely concerned about helping students do their best,” she says.  “Their friendliness and willingness to help others makes for a great place to learn.”

The Rural Opportunities in Medical Education (ROME) program also “appeals to me,” she says.  Studying medicine “in a rural area is an opportunity to see a broad range of cases and experiences.

“Being from a rural area, I can see myself working in that setting,” says Hoverson, who job-shadowed her sister when she was a ROME student under the supervision of Heidi Bittner, M.D. ’91 (Family Medicine Residency ’94), clinical assistant professor of family and community medicine, Devils Lake.  Bittner “has great patient-contact skills.”

One of the most moving, and pivotal, experiences she’s had involved a woman who suffered a second stroke affecting the previously unaffected side of her brain.

“The doctor placed his hand on hers,” she recalls, “and although she could not physically speak, she spoke to him through her tear-filled eyes.  It was obvious that she trusted him to do the best he could to help her recover.”

Growing up on the Navajo reservation in New Mexico, Rachelle Miles did not see a lot of Native American physicians, but when she was about 10, her father showed her a book with a picture of Taylor McKenzie, M.D., the first Navajo doctor, surrounded by students.

The daughter of Eugene and Laverne Miles of Crystal, NM, thought, “Wow, a Navajo could be a doctor!” she recalls.  “That’s my earliest recollection” about medicine as a possible career.

“I thought, ‘I want to do that.’”

Her father always talked to her about education, she says, although he hadn’t been encouraged to value and pursue an education when he was younger.  In time, she began to believe that she could “go way up there” in her career and didn’t have to become “another statistic” on the reservation, where the incidence of alcoholism is high.

Miles, who earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Arizona State University in 2003, gained valuable experience working two years at a branch of the National Institutes of Health in Phoenix where she conducted research on diabetes in Pima Indians.  The Pimas have the highest prevalence of diabetes of any type of people in the nation, she explains.  That experience “triggered” her decision to attend medical school.

“I can identify with that (Native American) population,” says Miles, who hopes someday to work to improve the health of her people, the Navajo, the largest Native American tribe in the United States.

She chose UND over other schools with strong Native American programs (New Mexico, Dartmouth, Oklahoma) because she sensed that UND’s INMED program is very family-oriented and supportive, she says.

Looking back, she says “it’s been a difficult road,” but her family continually told her to “keep going, keep pushing for my dreams.”

Medicine “is my dream — so I’ll go wherever it takes me.”

When she was in the eighth-grade, Kristin Streifel’s father suffered a heart attack.  He was only 45.              

“I saw how the doctors and nurses worked to save his life,” she recalls.  The event was pivotal, pointing her towards medicine.

Even so, the daughter of Randy and Jane Streifel of Powers Lake, ND, began her undergraduate studies in business at Concordia College in Moorhead, MN.  In her sophomore year, she “realized that business is not what I loved” and changed her course towards medicine, which is “really where my heart is.”  She completed a

bachelor’s degree in biology with a minor in chemistry last May.

Streifel applied to eight medical schools, mostly in the Midwest, but says “UND was my top choice” because of the patient-centered

curriculum in which students learn in small groups of seven or eight.

“I really like the small groups and learning with people you know... and the patient contact – that’s really enticing for me,” she says.  “I just thought that was so cool.”

She’s also intrigued by the ROME program which places third-year medical students in rural communities such as Dickinson, Hettinger, Jamestown, Devils Lake and Williston.

“I like the option of going to different hospitals, to explore other places and see how they do things,” she says.

- Pamela D. Knudson

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