MEDEX Northwest, established in 1969, is proud of its long-standing mission to train health care providers who will practice primary care in medically underserved and rural areas of the UW School of Medicine’s service region (Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, Idaho—or WWAMI).  MEDEX also has a formal agreement to train students from Nevada.  Most of our more than 1300 graduates work in the WWAMI region.

MEDEX offers a competency-based training program that accepts applicants with previous health care experience (such as nursing, EMTs, Alaska community health aides, medical assistants, athletic training, former military corpsmen, etc.).  Three classroom sites serve students from a wide geographic range, and clinical training takes place throughout the WWAMI region and beyond.  The very diverse MEDEX students fulfill the program’s mission to improve access to primary health care as well as developing new professional roles for PAs.

Our faculty and staff bring considerable experience to the MEDEX program.  The Program Director, Ruth Ballweg, has been a PA for almost 30 years, and has made significant contributions to the development of the profession and physician assistant education.  The 20 core faculty members include PAs with between 2 and more than 30 years experience, an NP, 2 physicians and research faculty.  The 18-member staff includes individuals with extensive involvement in and familiarity with the field of PA education as well as experienced research staff.