With hundreds of career options in the health care field alone, choosing a profession can be daunting for any student. The University of Missouri’s second annual Health Professions Summit from June 14 to 17 offers culturally diverse high school students hands-on experiences and first-hand information from health care educators and practitioners to help make that decision easier.

Kathleen Quinn, director of MU’s Area Health Education Center (AHEC), said the program is intended to attract a more diverse group of health care professionals to effectively mirror Missouri’s population. Students from Cristo Rey High School in midtown Kansas City will spend three days rotating through activities and informational sessions hosted by the MU School of Medicine, the Sinclair School of Nursing, the School of Health Professions, and the West Central Missouri Area Health Education Center.

Activities will include touring the medical school’s Russell D. and Mary B. Shelden Clinical Simulation Center, and practicing physical exams, patient transfers and injections at the nursing school. At the School of Health Professions, students will experience therapies related to the various disciplines offered by the school, including gait analysis, a mirror-image writing exercise and a live ultrasound. Students will also participate in a campus tour, a student panel and visit the student recreation center.

“It’s not just a camp where students are exposed to the health professions and that’s it,” Quinn said. “We want to have a longitudinal dedication to these students, staying in touch to provide them with information and opportunities in the same way we connect with rural undergraduate students who are pre-admitted to the medical school.”

The connection maintained by year-round activities offered by the West Central Missouri AHEC is already working. Four students who took part in last year’s summit are returning this year as student leaders and mentors to nine new students. Two Cristo Rey students from last year’s summit will also attend the medical school’s weeklong mini medical school experience in July.

Cristo Rey is a college preparatory high school in Kansas City sponsored by the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth. It allows students to participate in work-study as employees of partner businesses to offset the cost of their tuition. Participating in the MU health summit is one way that the school’s many first-generation and minority college students are able to interact with health care professionals and get a taste of what it would be like to attend MU, said Maureen Gregg, Cristo Rey’s school nurse who has helped build a partnership with the university.

“We have so many students interested in health care careers. Getting them to MU and allowing them to have hands-on experience with the different disciplines really helps them see what their options are,” Gregg said. “It’s opening up a whole world of what’s available to them.”

• Click here for more information about AHEC.
• Click here for more information about Cristo Rey High School.