RUMFORD – Drs. Jennifer Dressel and Michael Gravatt II have joined Rumford Hospital and Swift River Health Care as residents in the Central Maine Medical Center Rural Track Residency Program. In the three-year program, residents spend their first year in Lewiston with their class, but during their second and third years they have the opportunity to learn what it is like to practice in a rural community instead of the large, urban hospitals they have become accustomed to.

Last summer, Dr. Brian Dressel began his first year as a resident at Rumford Hospital. Dressel is now chief resident during this, his third year in the program.

Jennifer Dressel, who is married to Brian Dressel, is also a graduate of Boston University’s Medical School. She grew up in southern New Jersey suburbs and frequently vacationed in Maine as a child. She and her husband would like to practice in rural New England when they complete their residencies. The Dressels live in Livermore and have one young child and are expecting another. They enjoy outdoor activities such as hiking, camping, skiing and scuba diving.

Gravatt came to medicine after being a Navy hospital corpsman for five years. He earned his medical degree from the Medical University of the Americas. He also holds a doctorate in naturopathic medicine from Bastyr University. He was attracted to the CMMC family residency program because it was the only one he found with both a rural track and a wilderness medicine track. When he finishes his residency, he would like to work in a rural area. In addition to outdoor activities such as hiking, kayaking and bow hunting, he enjoys contra dancing, reading poetry and philosophy.

All three residents are seeing and accepting new patients at Swift River Health Care. Call 369-0146 for more information.