Western University of Health Sciences Oregon hosted its inaugural Rural Health Care Equity Fair (RHCEF) at the Lebanon River Center on Saturday, May 3, 2025. The RHCEF was a free health care event that featured a variety of health services and educational opportunities for community members.

The event was organized by first-year College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific-Northwest (COMP-Northwest) students Tiffany Tran, Ashley Kao, and Eliora Olivares. After moving from Orange County, California to Lebanon to begin medical school last fall, Tran was eager to find a way to give back to the community.
“A lot of us are transplants here. A big part of our curriculum is community service learning or CSL hours,” said Tran. “We want to be able to give back to the community and for me personally, I thought the best way to do that was to literally bring health care to the community.”
Kao was grateful for the opportunity to give back to her community. Upon starting medical school last fall, she was overwhelmed by the support she received from the Lebanon community and was eager to find a way to give back.
“This town and this community really welcomed us in a way I wasn’t expecting coming from a more urban area. Moving here was a big change, and the community really openly accepted us,” said Kao. “When we went deeper into the community, we found that a lot of people didn’t have a primary care physician or they were actively seeking medical care, but they didn’t know where to go. That was one of the driving factors for this idea: how do we fill those gaps for a community that’s given us so much already?”

During the RHCEF, guests had the opportunity to participate in a variety of health services. WesternU College of Health Sciences-Northwest (CHS-Northwest) and COMP-Northwest students and faculty provided general health screenings, osteopathic manipulative therapy (OMT) educational demonstrations, balance screenings, youth physicals, infant developmental screenings, and more. In addition to health services, students and community partners provided education and resources on a variety of topics related to mental and physical wellbeing.
The RHCEF was an opportunity for community members to quickly get connected to accessible health care resources and help ensure access to care in the future. An on-site Health Navigator was available to get patients signed up for the Oregon Health Plan and connected with free clinics in the area. For CHS-Northwest students, this meant connecting guests with Practical Applications Lab (PALs), the pro bono physical therapy clinic.

“We are trying to get a couple people from today to potentially be patients of ours in PALs, especially patients that score lower on the scale that we’re using to measure falls and frailty,” said CHS-Northwest second-year student Brandon Miyashiro, who was providing balance screenings. “I think one of the biggest challenges in the medical field is finding information. It’s really helpful to navigate the medical field when you have somebody who knows what to look for and gives them a better area to start from.”
For some guests, the RHCEF was an opportunity to explore different resources and types of care they might not typically have access to. Lebanon resident Vanessa Rabine received OMT from a COMP-Northwest faculty volunteer for the first time to alleviate tightness on her neck and hip.
“I go to the chiropractor quite a bit, but I’ve never had anybody do this type of manipulation and it was amazing,” said Rabine. “I was very impressed with that I received today, and I definitely want to try to find somebody that can continue to do OMT for me.”
During the event, pre-medical students from Oregon State University volunteered to help guests register and complete paperwork.
“I used to work at a farm worker union, so I’ve seen the discrepancies in health care with people in rural communities or who just don’t have access to insurance and resources that are important to maintaining good health and a good life. I wanted to do more and expand that to other communities like Lebanon,” said OSU student Andrea Garcia Torres.
WesternU plans to continue offering this free community resource each spring. Dr. Gina Miller, Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and faculty event organizer, is enthusiastic about the event’s potential to grow in the coming years as a way to help address the national health care shortage.
“If you look at the Lebanon community currently, we’re in a real shortage of primary care providers and people are not able to get into their own physician for month and months, or they can’t get established with a physician, even if they have insurance. We have a lot of community members with no insurance or who are underinsured, with a very high deductible plan they choose not to utilize unless it’s a dire emergency,” said Dr. Miller. “We want to be able to put this resource out there that, moving forward, the community will be able to count on every spring to come get a checkup if they have not been able to do so elsewhere. Our goal is to help increase the overall health and wellness of our community be providing information, screenings, and engaging people in the right direction for care.”
The success of this event was made possible through the support and collaboration of numerous community partners. Contributing organizations include the River Center, the Community Health Centers (CHC) Dental Program, OHSU Knight Cancer Institute, Osteopathic Physicians and Surgeons of Oregon (OPSO), Oregon Pacific Area Health Education Center (OPAHEC), Lebanon Area Mental Health Alliance, East Linn Community Clinic, Pollywog, Family Tree Relief Nursery, Mid-Valley Birthing Services, and the Samaritan Mobile Medicine Clinic. This event was sponsored by the Oregon Academy of Family Physicians (OAFP) and OPAHEC.

“Seeing our students and faculty come together to serve the Lebanon and surrounding communities was inspiring. There was such a sense of pride in giving back to the place we call home. The Rural Health Care Equity Fair wasn’t just about providing services—it was about building relationships, listening, and showing up for our neighbors. This event affirmed why we do what we do, and we couldn’t be more grateful to be part of such a generous and resilient community,” said Dr. Miller.