Salinas, Calif. (August 10, 2017) — Natividad Medical Center (NMC) has partnered with the University of California San Francisco’s HEAL Initiative (Health, Equity, Action and Leadership), which helps to create and sustain a pipeline of health professionals to care for the most vulnerable populations domestically and abroad. Dr. Kristin Burstedt, a 2017 graduate of the NMC Family Medicine Residency Program, has been accepted into the HEAL Initiative Fellowship Program and will be NMC’s first site fellow focusing on a project in Salinas.

“We are excited to partner with UCSF’s HEAL Initiative to help patients in communities that don’t have access to necessary healthcare resources and trained health professionals,” said Craig A. Walls, M.D., Ph.D., chief medical officer of NMC. “HEAL Fellows work in these communities on the frontlines for two years as they go through immersive training and develop skills essential to the delivery of global health.”

The HEAL Initiative works in Native American reservations, prisons and resource-poor communities around the world that suffer most from death, diseases and lack of healthcare. They pair dedicated U.S. providers with local health professionals who are already working in these communities.

NMC is also an underserved domestic site that provides HEAL Initiative curriculum for fellows through NMC’s faculty. Dr. Chris Carpenter, service director of Pediatrics, is NMC’s site faculty member of the HEAL Initiative.

Dr. Kristin Burstedt’s two-year fellowship will begin this summer. She will provide clinical care in Salinas while receiving mentorship and a connection to a broader group of healthcare professionals dedicated to advancing care for the underserved. She will be joined by HEAL Rotating Fellows, Dr. Nathaniel Uchtmann and Dr. Rachel Lusk of UCSF who will be working in Liberia, Nepal, respectively, and in the pediatric department of NMC, each for six months.

As the only teaching hospital on the Central Coast, NMC’s Family Medicine Residency Program has been a partner of UCSF’s since 1975.

About Natividad Medical Center (NMC)
Owned and operated by Monterey County, NMC is a 172-bed, acute-care hospital providing health care services to county residents for more than 132 years. Based in Salinas, California, NMC offers inpatient, outpatient, emergency, diagnostic and specialty medical care. NMC provides more than 38,000 patient days of care each year and has more than 52,000 emergency department visits per year. NMC is a Level II Trauma Center providing the immediate availability of specialized personnel, equipment and services to treat the most severe and critical injuries. NMC’s Trauma Center is a vital community service locally that saves lives and eliminates the need to fly critically injured patients to a distant trauma center. NMC is ranked No. 1 in newborn deliveries in Monterey County and is the only teaching hospital on the Central Coast through its affiliation with the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). With a medical staff of more than 350 physicians, NMC’s mission is to continually monitor and improve the health of the people, including the vulnerable, in Monterey County through coordinated, affordable high-quality health care. For more information, please call 831-755-4111 or visit www.natividad.com.