Hurley Medical Center is a teaching hospital with a major affiliation with Michigan State University College of Human Medicine, as well as other MSU colleges, which are collaborating to help the community of Flint through its challenges with water contaminated with lead and other issues.

To keep up to date on these interprofessional efforts, check out the MSU Spartan MI IMPACT page, which describes how MSU and Flint are “partnering for a healthier future.”

The page is frequently updated. In March 2016, it featured:

• The Big Ten Network public service announcement on how MSU and the University of Michigan are working together to help the people of Flint.

• The Empower Flint mobile device app, developed by MSU researchers with its affiliate PBS station, WKAR, and Flint residents. The app provides a checklist of action items Flint residents should take to protect their families and pets from lead in water.

• Flint’s University Avenue Corridor revival project, connecting the University of Michigan/MSU-Flint campuses with campuses of Hurley Medical Center and Kettering University, plus surrounding areas, which involves problem-solving research by MSU criminologists, such as community policing foot patrols that began in 1979.

• The testing of the Flint River for trihalomethanes and other contaminants, which can cause cancer.

• The MSU-Hurley Children’s Hospital Pediatric Public Health Initiative, led by Hurley’s Mona Hanna-Attisha MD MPH.

• Ongoing community updates from MSU’s Division of Public Health.

• Other Flint health issues, such as food deserts, as mapped out by MSU’s public health scientist Rick Sadler.

• Two MSU faculty members named to Michigan Governor Rick Snyder’s 17-member Flint Water Interagency Coordinating Committee, which is charged with finding long-term solutions for Flint’s water system.

• Answers to some of the most commonly asked questions related to Flint’s water issues and health, from an interview with Hurley’s Mona Hanna-Attisha MD MPH, published Jan. 30, 2016, in the Detroit Free Press.

• Food assistance resources for Flint families, provided by MSU experts and Hurley Children’s Hospital.

• An MSU public health water expert’s efforts to improve water-quality testing for lead, Legionella and other contaminants, particularly a rapid-response water diagnostic service for future communities in need.

• MSU’s research team of economic, policy and fiscal experts (who have worked with Flint officials since 2009, well before state-appointed emergency managers took over), who provide budget, fiscal and strategic-planning training for city council members and continue to research deeper Flint issues.

• The 2014 $9 million CS Mott Foundation grant to MSU CHM, which supported the expansion of the medical school in downtown Flint.

• The MSU CHM Leadership in Medicine for the Underserved program, which helps medical students to develop the knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary to meet medical needs in various settings, such as urban, rural and international underserved populations – including the Flint community.

• The Flint-based MSU CHM Division of Public Health, which was created with a partnership between the CS Mott Foundation, Hurley Medical Center and two other Flint hospitals that are part of the MSU-CHM Flint Campus.

• Four Flint community projects funded by the MSU College of Arts and Letters, which are designed to boost community relations, use community engagement to create shared research opportunities, and to incorporate the City of Flint’s goals as listed in its 20-year strategic plan, Imagine Flint.

• The MSU Pediatric Public Health Fund, which helps to pay for interventions aimed at helping children affected by lead exposure in Flint.

• A reminder about the 100-year history of MSU and Flint working together. MSU and Flint were both founded in 1855. Today, the MSU Extension continues to help Flint residents in areas related to health, jobs, families and more.

• MSU veterinary experts who are helping families to protect their pets from lead exposure and to keep them healthy overall.

• MSU student athletes, marching band members, student group leaders, and athletics department staff who helped to distribute water and bags that will help with recycling the plastic bottles.

Above photo: MSU highlights its Flint partnerships on its MI Impact web page, http://mispartanimpact.msu.edu/stories/flint/.