NHSC Allows Pediatrician to Practice the Kind of Medicine He Prefers

The worried couple couldn't speak any English, but Dr. Michael Colli could tell that something was wrong with their little girl. They were newly arrived from Mexico-likely drawn to Chambersburg, Pennsylvania by the local harvest season-and from their hand gestures, Colli was able to deduce that their 15-month-old daughter was experiencing abdominal pain. He ordered an x-ray, but the belly looked clear. That's when he noticed something unusual.

"Lo and behold, the x-ray showed that this child had been born with a congenitally dislocated hip," Colli recalls. "She would never walk normally, and would probably always walk with a lot of pain, if it wasn't fixed. But because the family had never had access to health care prior to this, her condition had gone undiagnosed for more than a year."

He used an interpreter to explain the situation to the parents, and referred the little girl to an orthopedist in Hershey, Pennsylvania for treatment. Now when he tells the story, Colli can't help but express the profound impact it had on both him and the immigrant family. "I think this child's life would have been greatly different if her birth defect had never been found," he marvels. It was exactly this kind of service-oriented approach to medicine that made Colli an ideal candidate for NHSC, and NHSC's scholarship program a perfect fit for him.

Weighing the Factors of Medicine

Colli went into pediatrics for the same reason that most people choose to: because he loves working with children and also admits to being a "big kid at heart." Apparently he made the right choice. Keystone Health Clinic, in Chambersburg, recognized his talent and personal appeal, and was more than eager for him to join their staff. Since Colli's arrival in the small town 2 years ago, he's risen to the position of chairman of pediatrics at the local hospital. But without financial assistance from NHSC, he may never have chosen pediatrics as his medical specialty.

"Imagine, finishing 11 years of training and staring down the barrel of $150,000 debt," he explains, noting that pediatricians are among the lowest compensated categories of physicians. Colli readily admits that the 2-year NHSC scholarship he was awarded helped him comfortably make the choice to go into pediatrics. He could focus on helping his patients without too much concern for the amount of his paycheck. Essentially, NHSC allowed Colli to practice the kind of medicine he likes with the type of patients that he prefers to see.

For Love, or for Money?

Colli heard about the NHSC from fellow medical students who were looking for financial assistance. He was single at the time, and was only slightly daunted by the prospect of moving to a new and unfamiliar community after his residency. "I just looked at the positives and the negatives," he recalls. "The positives were the financial aspects; avoiding enormous debt and being able to choose the specialty that I wanted. The negative possibility was where I might be located. When I added up the plus- and the minus side of my list, the positives clearly outweighed the negative."

He encourages other medical students to balance these same considerations before choosing a specialty ¾ indeed, Colli extends a more general caution to undergraduates who are considering medicine as a career option: "If you want to take a job because of the money, medicine isn't the way to go." He explains, "You have to go into medicine for the right reasons: because you like seeing patients, you like helping people, and even further, you like helping people who may not have much. But if you think you're going to make $750,000 a year and drive a Maserati to work, your eyes will be sadly opened."

Making the Right Choice

Colli is married now, and he and his wife just had their first child. While Chambersburg hasn't offered the same opportunities for his wife's career—she's a pediatric intensive care nurse—as it has for his, he believes they're both very comfortable with the style of life provided by this small, rural farming community. Colli doesn't drive an Italian sports car but he's gained far more through his pediatric work in Chambersburg than he likely would have practicing as a non-primary care specialist in a big city. And NHSC's scholarship left him with a manageable debt of $35,000-about one-fifth of the financial burden that many physicians carry after residency.

He's also had the opportunity to make meaningful changes that will impact the children and families of Chambersburg for years to come. Shortly after his arrival, Colli realized that ear, nose, and throat specialty services were sadly lacking for children who required financial assistance. "If you have a child who needs ear tubes, but there's no ENT doctor to do it, then they can potentially have hearing loss," he says, adding, "You could have a whole population of children who have impaired hearing, based on socioeconomic class." Colli worked with Keystone Health Center's administrator to bring that aspect of care under the umbrella of the community health clinic.

Colli also lectures at child birthing classes, and is working with the pediatric inpatient unit at the hospital to make the atmosphere more colorful and, "child friendly" for the young patients who are admitted there. His newest endeavor is to expand the number of pediatricians practicing in Chambersburg from four to eight to meet the current needs of the community, as well as prepare for the growth that new employers have already initiated in the town.

His 2-year service contract with the NHSC was recently fulfilled, but Michael Colli has signed on for another 3 years with Keystone Health Center. He credits his decision to the opportunities offered by practice in a rural, medically underserved community. "I feel very successful here," he reports, "and I feel very wanted by my patients. I don't know if my experience would be the same in a big city."

Learn about other NHSC success stories.