Contributed ALWAYS TEACHING Dr. Jane Daugherty-Luck, a native of Colliers, helps students connect in her role as an assistant dean with the West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine.

LEWISBURG For nearly three decades, Dr. Jane Daugherty-Luck was an emergency medicine physician, where quick decisions can restore the health of a sick or injured patient.

Today, in her role as one of eight regional assistant deans serving the West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicines Statewide Campus, shes responsible for another type of transformation helping third- and fourth-year medical students navigate their latter years of medical school.

Medical students dont realize all the little things they dont know, Daugherty-Luck said. Guiding them along that path is great. Its a gradual climb for a while, and then all of a sudden they hit a peak and soar straight up. Its nice to watch them succeed.

Daugherty-Luck, a graduate of WVSOMs Class of 1991, oversees students in the schools Northern Region, which encompasses West Virginias Brooke, Hancock, Marshall, Ohio, Tyler and Wetzel counties. Born and raised in Colliers, she developed an interest in science during her childhood and said medicine was one of the only professions that seemed suitable for smart girls at the time.

I cant remember not thinking about medicine. It just seemed the thing for me, she said. I liked solving mysteries and puzzles, and I liked the idea of hearing peoples stories. I liked that you get to hear interesting accounts of how something happened or how someone came to be diagnosed.

After earning a bachelors degree in chemistry from Alderson Broaddus College in Philippi, W.Va., Daugherty-Luck interviewed with two of West Virginias medical schools. She was influenced to consider WVSOM by her grandfather, whose beloved primary care physician was a doctor of osteopathic medicine, but her choice ultimately came down to the school she believed was a better fit for her personality.

On my other interviews, I didnt like the people I was interviewing with. They seemed dull and stuffy. At WVSOM, I interviewed with friendly people I felt I would enjoy hanging out and studying with. They would talk about other things in their life besides their career, and thats what made them interesting, she said.

Daugherty-Luck discovered her future specialty during an internship, noting that she fell into it accidentally.

At that time we had to do a one-year rotating internship, and the only rotation I liked was emergency medicine, because that was where I felt people actually wanted to teach me, she said. I remember a nurse coming to me, saying, This lady is in atrial fibrillation, and I said, Really? Shes here for finger pain. The nurse said, I took her pulse, and its really fast. Thats how I learned that vital signs could point you to the actual diagnosis. It turned out that the finger pain was referred from her heart.

After completing a residency at Clevelands Brentwood Hospital (now known as South Pointe Hospital), Daugherty-Luck worked as an emergency medicine physician in nearby Richmond Heights for two years before relocating to northwestern Kansas, where she would spend the next 12 years as assistant director of emergency medicine at Hays Medical Center.

It was during this period that she developed an interest in niche topics that she has continued to lecture on during her time at WVSOM. Following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Daugherty-Luck assembled informational lectures to help emergency department staff learn about disaster planning and decontamination. She subsequently attended an incident response to terrorist bombings class presented by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

The class was a great experience. I learned about different types of explosive materials and the unique problems associated with these situations. A bomb that goes off in an open square, in a crowd of people, will create a different pattern of injuries than a bomb that goes off in a confined space or in water, and injury patterns are important to emergency medicine, she said.

Daugherty-Luck returned to West Virginia in 2009, working at Ohio Valley Medical Center in Wheeling and East Ohio Regional Hospital in Martins Ferry, and acting as an associate faculty member in the two hospitals emergency medicine residency program.

She also served as a preceptor, providing clinical training and mentoring to students in a variety of health care fields, and delivered lectures on terrorism and bombing response to WVSOM students during a popular wilderness medicine rotation established by former faculty member Dr. Lisa Hrutkay. It was only natural that when the opportunity came in 2022 to become a regional assistant dean, she would return to her alma mater full time.

Today, Daugherty-Luck works to ensure that medical students on clinical rotations feel supported, are in effective learning environments and stay on track to graduate. But the best guidance she can offer students has nothing to do with the classroom or the clinic, she said.

Her advice?

Know that theres more to life than medical school. Students need to get out and go to the movies, read books, do things that have nothing to do with medicine. Theyll say they dont have time, but if I were in their situation, I would find a way. It makes you relatable. It makes you interesting. It makes you a person. If youre only talking doctor stuff to a patient, its hard to make a connection. But if you can say, I read that book thats in your bag, or, I saw that movie too, thats how you connect.

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WVSOM regional assistant dean: Medical students must learn to connect with patients - The Steubenville Herald-Star