UT Tyler says the towering crane at the construction site signals a major milestone as the school moves from groundwork to the tangible beginnings of the School of Medicine facility.

Special to the Tyler Morning Telegraph

The Texas Tribune will host an event this week in Tyler during which local health care leaders will discuss how rural communities are solving health challenges.

With small-town hospitals closing across Texas, many communities are rethinking their approach to health care as they reimagine community health models, lean into telemedicine and more.

In Tyler, there’s a new health college in the works, and Texans are relocating to the East Texas city amid excitement about local opportunities in the medical field. This type of focus and innovation around rural health care has benefited from investment approved by state lawmakers.

This Friday, the community is invited to join The Texas Tribune in person at Tyler Junior College or online for a conversation about opportunities and innovations in rural health care.

Jess Huff, the Tribune’s East Texas reporter, will talk with local health care leaders and government officials about how communities like Tyler are taking on health care challenges, how the Texas Legislature and state agencies are supporting these efforts and how the future of health care will look in rural Texas.

Huff is based in Lufkin. The Utah native most recently worked for The Lufkin Daily News, leading the publication to numerous awards for investigative reporting in the region.

Confirmed speakers include Kirk Calhoun, MD, president of UT Tyler and board chair of UT Health East Texas; Kristina Childress, senior public health official and administrator of Angelina County and Cities Health District; and Doug Curran, MD, chief medical officer, East Texas Community Clinic.

Calhoun is president of UT Tyler and chairman of the UT Health East Texas board of directors. In 2020, UT Tyler administratively merged with The University of Texas Health Science Center at Tyler, combining the academic and health operations to form a new comprehensive university serving east Texas. The new UT Tyler School of Medicine, which enrolled its first class of students in 2023, is the first medical school in East Texas. From 2002 to 2020, Calhoun served as president of UT Health Science Center at Tyler, during which time the campus grew significantly. He is a Professor of Medicine and has an MD from the University of Kansas.

Childress, currently serving as the senior public health official in Angelina County, is committed to ensuring compliance, strategic planning and effective public health services. She brings 16 years of experience in emergency preparedness, health promotion, community education and leadership, with a focus on evidence-based approaches to drive the development, implementation, and improvement of programs and services.

Curran, chief medical officer at East Texas Community Clinic, has practiced family medicine for over 40 years. He is currently working to obtain Federally Qualified Health Center status for East Texas Community Clinic, to fill the gaps of medical care in East Texas, and working with UT Northeast in establishing a family medicine residency program in Athens, Texas.

There is still time to RSVP. There are approximately 400 Texans who plan to watch the program virtually from around the state, and 80 RSVPs for in-person.

For those attending in-person, the event will be at Tyler Junior College main campus in the Apache Room on the first floor. Guests can park in lot S-4 next to Rogers Student Center (RSC). Doors open at noon for a complimentary lunch with the conversation beginning at 12:30 p.m.

The event will also be live-streamed online and available on demand afterward at texastribune.org/events.

AARP Texas, Christus Health, and Methodist Healthcare Ministries are major sponsors of the event.

The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan public media organization whose mission is to promote civic engagement and discourse on public policy, politics, government, and other matters of statewide interest. For more information, visit https://www.texastribune.org/events/. To support the Texas Tribune, consider a donation.