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The medical school is bolstering its community engagement programs with the formation of the new Division of Outreach Medicine. 

Housed within the Department of Family and Community Medicine, the goal of the Division of Outreach Medicine is to expand existing efforts at WMed, and to further develop platforms and structures to support impactful work being done in the community through initiatives like Street Medicine Kalamazoo (SMKzoo). 

“The work of the Division of Outreach Medicine is vital in forwarding our commitment to health equity for all in Southwest Michigan,” WMed Dean Robert G. Sawyer, ���ϲʿ���ֱ��, said. “I am grateful to everyone who has been involved in its development and will continue to ensure its success.” 

The addition of the new division will allow for all internal supports that currently exist for WMed clinics and divisions to also be appropriately available for the work being done by the Division of Outreach Medicine. The division will be led by Daniel Stulberg, ���ϲʿ���ֱ��, chair of the Department of Family and Community Medicine. 

“We have so many people here at WMed doing wonderful things to support the community and to support the learners that we have,” Dr. Stulberg said. “My goal in assisting the Division of Outreach Medicine is to help, wherever possible, to develop the infrastructure as well as the policies to help these programs continue to do the wonderful work that they’re doing.” 

Among the programs the Division of Outreach Medicine will support is SMKzoo, which offers healthcare services for people who are unhoused, living on the streets, in encampments, in shelters, or other temporary housing. The initiative was launched in January 2021 by medical students, resident physicians, and attending physicians from the medical school, taking medical care directly to people, meeting them where they are. 

The Division for Outreach Medicine also intends to assist ongoing efforts with the Kalamazoo Gospel Mission. A group led by Cheryl Dickson, ���ϲʿ���ֱ��, MPH, chief diversity officer and associate dean for Health Equity, currently offers health screenings at the gospel mission. 

“We’ve got wonderful programs that are already up and running,” Dr. Stulberg said. “I want to work in the background to help support all of those programs so that we can be more enmeshed with the community, support more of these community programs, and provide the tools that they need to be successful.” 

Other primary tasks of the Division of Outreach Medicine, Dr. Stulberg said, include streamlining the process in which medical professionals can volunteer with these programs and establishing additional institutional affiliation agreements with Western Michigan University in research and psychology. 

“As I learn more about these programs, I learn more about some of the various things that one program is doing that might help another program, so we’re looking at best practices across things and aligning those so that we can best serve our community, faculty, staff, and learners,” Dr. Stulberg said. “It’s a complicated process, which is fun and rewarding.”