The Indiana Primary Care Scholars Consortium held its statewide Orientation at the Landsbaum Center for Health Education on the Union Hospital Campus in Terre Haute, IN. Medical students participating in the Summer Programs around the State of Indiana were in attendance on May 30, 2008.

The Primary Care Scholars Consortium, created in 1999, is a statewide program coordinated by the Indiana University School of Medicine, Department of Family Medicine in partnership with Union Hospital's Richard G. Lugar Center for Rural Health. Other partners include: Deaconess Hospital Family Medicine Residency Program, Fort Wayne Medical Education Program, Indiana Academy of Family Physicians Foundation, IUSM Primary Care Scholars' Program, and St. Joseph Regional Medical Center Family Medicine Residency.

The program is designed to result in an increase in the number of primary care physicians in rural and other underserved areas of Indiana. Toward this end, the Consortium offers high quality, service-linked training opportunities each summer to first year medical students. This summer, approximately 40 medical students are spending eight-weeks experiencing first hand what it is like to practice medicine in these rural and underserved urban communities.

National and state research indicate that early and frequent exposure to primary care and underserved populations is essential in the development of future primary care providers and their choice to practice in rural and urban underserved communities. Indiana, like all other states in the nation, is woefully short of primary care providers in these underserved areas. It is therefore essential to work together to develop, implement and strengthen programming that provides students with first hand quality educational health care experiences. The Indiana Primary Care Scholars Consortium has put such programming together with help from additional partnering organizations, communities and businesses who are working together to meet the needs of our students and our state.