“I started making calls and asking friends for favors, but finding a preceptor is difficult enough without the complication of one month over my head,” she recalls.

Enter Robert Birk, PA-C’02, a physician assistant with Community Memorial Hospital Oconto Medical Center in Oconto, WI. He took Morris on rotation and also demonstrated to her true patient care.

“I cannot say enough how much he cares about his patients…his patients know he cares,” Morris says. “It was not uncommon to see whole families during visits and then, in an afternoon visit, see extended family because word has spread that they found a trusted practitioner in the community.”

Morris’ comments were part of her nomination of Birk for the Wisconsin Academy of Physician Assistants (WAPA) 2012 Physician Assistant of the Year, an honor he accepted in October. He was selected for his excellence in patient care through relationships with his patients and colleagues, as well as for his service both in and outside of the medical community.

“Rob was just one of those guys that I knew would do great things in our profession.”
–Pam Chambers, M.P.H.’01, PA-C’92

“He really goes the extra mile,” says Morris, M.S.N., FNP-C.

Birk understands what it’s like being in a jam. He and his sister were raised by their older brother after cancer took their parents’ lives, before Birk was a teenager. As a medic with the U.S. Air Force, he worked his first duty assignment at Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha, NE, under James Tracy, D.O., who, Birk says, “more than once told me that I was more than just a medic.” Later sent to Eielson Air Force Base in Fairbanks, AK, he was mentored by Captain Jesse Ewing, PA-C, who involved him in clinical cases.

“I told PA Ewing that eventually I wanted to return to my hometown community and provide the much-needed medical care there,” Birk recalls. “I spoke about going to medical school. He said, ‘Why not be a PA? You can still be that small-town guy…most of your patients will still call you their doctor.’”

That put Birk on a PA path. He soldiered through his academic prerequisites between active duty and deployments to Saudi Arabia and Cuba. Once he was accepted into DMU’s PA program, his hospital commander agreed to release him from active military duty requirements 18 months early. Another jam: The base commander denied his release.

“I was devastated, to say the least,” Birk recalls. “My career goal hung right in front of me, just out of reach.”

Enter Pam Chambers, M.P.H.’01, PA-C’92, associate professor in DMU’s PA program, and Jodi Cahalan, Ph.D., M.P.H.’01, M.S.’93, PA-C’89, then program director and now dean of the College of Health Sciences. They gave Birk a deferral so he could begin the program the following year.

“I was beyond relieved and more thankful than ever,” he says. The next year, he was honorably discharged from the Air Force and began the PA program six days later.

“Rob was just one of those guys that I knew would do great things in our profession, as soon as I met him,” Chambers says.

Birk says he’s doing exactly what he wants – being that “small-town guy” in the county where he grew up, taking care of people he knew as a youngster, friends and now their children.

“I couldn’t be happier,” he says. “I thank DMU’s PA program for giving me the knowledge and tools I need to be a great primary care provider.”

Alumni can get involved in DMU’s PA program by serving as preceptors, signing up on the online alumni mentor map or lecturing on campus. To learn more, contact Jolene Kelly at 515-271-1685 or visit www.dmu.edu/alumni/volunteer/.

Gio Villanueva celebrates on the summit of Mount Edgecumbe, with Mount Fairweather in the distance.

Gio Villanueva’s energy almost literally sparks out of the phone, even though it’s 7:30 a.m. in Alaska and the sun won’t rise for at least another hour. His obvious drive is an asset in an area where the environment presents as many challenges as do his patients’ conditions. “From a patient point of view, I need to do the best possible job I can do given the resources we have,” says Villanueva, D.P.T.’07, ATC, a staff physical therapist at Mount Edgecumbe Hospital in Sitka, AK, a facility of the SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium (SEARHC). “You can’t just send someone down the road for additional or specialized care.”

That’s due in part because Sitka’s main road system entails “seven miles of road going north and south and seven miles going east-west,” he says. “In many places, the main transportation is not a car; it’s a boat or plane.”

Alaska’s fifth largest city (population: approximately 9,000), Sitka sits on Baranof Island on the outer coast of the state’s Inside Passage. In addition to the inpatient acute care he provides at the hospital, Villanueva offers outpatient care in the 18 Native American communities that form SEARHC, a nonprofit tribal health consortium.

“We don’t have an orthopedic doctor on staff. The specialists rotate, some every four months,” he says.

“Patient education is crucial.”

So is understanding the demands and realities of patients’ lives. “A lot of people can’t afford to get off work. If they’re injured at the height of salmon fishing season, they have to be able to keep going,” he says. “You have to look at what you can do when you know the patient can’t come to therapy as often as you’d like.”

That gives preventive care an important role. In 2011, Villanueva and his colleagues established a sports clinic at Mount Edgecumbe High School, where he meets with student athletes every Monday after work. “If I find something wrong, I refer them to their primary care provider,” he says. “We catch shoulder, knee and hip injuries, and we’ve even caught some infectious states.

“The school is really happy the clinic exists,” he adds. “There’s a bonus in making sure students are healthy.”

Gio Villanueva’s attire as a physical therapist can include a fur hat.

Expanding his horizons physically, professionally and personally was what Villanueva was seeking when he moved to Alaska more than two years ago. The Los Angeles native had been working in San Antonio, TX, when a colleague planted the idea of relocating in the nation’s largest state geographically but least densely populated. He intentionally timed his interview when the Sitka season was “dark, windy and rainy.” Now he loves living in what he calls “one of the hidden jewels of Alaska.”

“The beauty, the outdoor recreation, trekking up the mountains – it’s been a wonderful ride so far,” he says. “Eighty-five percent of Alaska are public lands for us to explore, pop a tent and experience.”

The experience, he notes, includes understanding the region’s culture and history. Its Native American tribes include the Tlingit Indians, who have lived continuously in Sitka for more than 50 centuries. The city also was the cultural and political hub of Russian America in the early 1800s; Sitka is where Russia officially transferred the Territory of Alaska to the United States on Oct. 18, 1867.

“No Native Americans were involved in that transition. You have to be sensitive toward that history,” he says. “To enjoy yourself and be successful here, you have to assimilate, integrate and respect and understand others, which has always been my mantra as a physical therapist. It’s all about the patient.”

That assimilation and respect go beyond his practice. “I was looking for the spirituality aspects, the family aspects, respect for the elderly and their lessons,” Villanueva says. “I’m Filipino-American, and I see that in my culture and in others I’ve traveled to. It makes you self-reflect on what makes you truly happy in life. Your value system changes.

“Growing up in LA, I was exposed to Beverly Hills. There’s nothing wrong with that, but this has opened up new ways of living for me,” he adds. “I’m just glad to be here.”