Post-Bulletin, Rochester MN

A trio of second-year medical students at Mayo Medical School have created their own way to get students nationwide to communicate with each other.

Eugenia Shmidt, Kevin Christensen and Daniel Chan created a Web site called “MD Connector.” It helps pre-med and medical students connect, study, get advice and find mentors.

“It all relates to health care in some way,” Christensen said. For example, pre-meds talk with medical students online and ask questions.

“It’s an opportunity for people to kind of get a window into what they may pursue in the future,” Shmidt said.

At the beginning of April, there were 534 users of MD Connector. More than 11,000 unique visitors have visited since October, when the site was launched.

The site’s designers invited users of MD Connector to submit essays about health reform. The three top entries will be presented at today’s session of the Mayo Clinic Health Policy Center National Symposium on Medical and Health Care Reform at Mayo in Rochester.

More than 100 submissions for projects were received. The top three include:

• Creating a Path to High Quality Health Care: The Implementation of a Quality Improvement Mechanism in the Education of Clinical Skills by Paul Di Capua of Yale.

• Jumpstarting Medical Education by Claire Fung and Jessica Schumer of Tulane University School of Medicine

• Narrowing the Health Education Chasm by Tamara Bavousett, Simon Curtis, Desiree de la Torre, Amelia Walling Maiga and Valerie P. Pracilio of Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center.

The MD Connector group also plans to start a national journal written for and by medical students, Shmidt said. The inaugural edition will include many of the symposium entries. Winners received cash prizes and complimentary symposium attendance.

MD Connector has also started a “Wiki study guide” where users edit the guide to help students master medical problems. The efforts will remain student focused.

“We wanted to give students a voice and have their opinions heard,” Christensen said.

Reporter Jeff Hansel covers health for the Post-Bulletin. Read his blog, Pulse on Health, at Postbulletin.com.