<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/3/1583614284224.jpeg" alt="Moran with fourth-year medical students Clara Strunk and Emily Lenherr. Salina Post photo" />
 <figcaption>Moran with fourth-year medical students Clara Strunk and Emily Lenherr. Salina Post photo</figcaption>
 </figure>By LESLIE EIKLEBERRY Salina PostUnited States Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) learned about rural medicine and primary care preparation during a stop in Salina Friday afternoon. With two fourth-year medical students as guides, Moran toured the University of Kansas School of Medicine Salina campus at 138 North Santa Fe Avenue.The Salina campus opened in 2011 and is "designed for students with a strong interest in Rural Medicine, Primary Care, and providing medical services to rural Kansas," according to information provided by the school. Eight students are admitted each year. As of May 2019, five classes, a total of 39 students, have graduated. Since the fall of 2017, the Salina medical school has shared space with the KU School of Nursing-Salina. With a similar intent, the local KU School of Nursing facility focuses on "educating nurses to practice in rural Kansas," according to information from the school.Dean Robert Moser, M.D., noted that funding from several foundations, not the State of Kansas, was used to establish the Salina campus, which occupies the old Planters State Bank/Bank of America building in downtown Salina.Moran spent approximately an hour at the Salina campus, touring the facility and asking questions of the student guides and school officials who were on the tour.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/3/1583614386298.jpeg" alt="This group of paintings depicting the four seasons, are just part of the art created by Kansas artists on display in the Salina facility. Salina Post photo&nbsp;" />
 <figcaption>This group of paintings depicting the four seasons, are just part of the art created by Kansas artists on display in the Salina facility. Salina Post photo&nbsp;</figcaption>
 </figure>The facility stays true to its Kansas mission, even down to the colorful artwork on the walls."So you'll see some different artworks as we go around and they're all Kansas which is kind of sticking with the theme of what this campus represents and how we encorporate Kansas every day," said tour guide Emily Lenherr, a fourth-year medical student from Windom.Moran asked the students whether they thought there was anything missing from their experience here that they might get at a larger medical school."Is there anything that you think you are missing. I assume that you could tell me that there are things, a good reason to be here, not there, but is there something that you regret that is not taking place?" Moran asked."I don't regret anything," said fourth-year student Clara Strunk from Mulvane."No. I think you would be hard-pressed to find a Salina student who says otherwise. We just have such wonderful experiences here and we feel so supported, and I would not have dreamed of a better way to go to medical school," Lenherr added.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2020/3/1583614601391.jpeg" alt="Dr. Trent Davis , left, joined the students and Moran on the tour. Salina Post photo" />
 <figcaption>Dr. Trent Davis , left, joined the students and Moran on the tour. Salina Post photo</figcaption>
 </figure>Moran then asked the students whether the big campuses treat Salina students with respect. Both agreed that they did."They should. You get higher grades," Salina physican Trent Davis quipped."When they come over as third-year students, they are very well prepared," he assured Moran."So the medical community across Kansas wouldn't have any reason to differentiate between a student who graduates here or Wichita or Kansas City," Moran noted.Davis is one of a number of Salina physicians who help train the medical students."Are there students who come here with no intention of a rural practice, but the setting then lent itself to maybe that's really what I want to do?" Moran asked his student tour guides."I think that you can definitely say that that's happened to a couple of people that have gone out from this campus. You know, you just kind of fall in love with the way the medicine is practiced in a smaller town. I think certainly we have people that come in dead set that they're going to go rural and realize that maybe that's not what they're doing," Strunk responded."Either way, I think it benefits rural medicine, simply because you end up with people who are passionate about rural medicine in those rural areas and they're more likely to stay," she added.

Moran visits Salina, KU School of Medicine