Dr. Michael R. Kramer
MACON — Mercer University School of Medicine recently appointed Dr. Michael R. Kramer as director of the Center for Rural Health and Health Disparities, one of the first National Institutes of Health Centers of Excellence focused on rural health.
The Center for Rural Health and Health Disparities is housed within the College of Medicine and is committed to implementing community-driven solutions to health disparities issues in rural Georgia. The Center manages a $6 million+ federal portfolio focused on reducing maternal and infant mortality, preventing opioid overdoses, and self-management of chronic diseases.
“We are pleased that Dr. Michael Kramer will join Mercer University School of Medicine in a leadership role in the Center for Rural Health and Health Disparities,” said Dean Gene Sumner, M.D., FACP. “He will guide us in building strong collaborations in rural Georgia and continue our tradition of outstanding and meaningful research.”
Dr. Kramer began his medical career as a physician assistant and earned his Medical Master's degree from Emory University in 1997. Dr. Kramer worked in urban and rural clinical settings for 10 years, including four years at Sage Hospital on the Navajo Nation in Arizona. Dr. Kramer served as the Emergency Department Director at DeKalb Medical Center until returning to Georgia in 2004 to join the emergency department there. Dr. Kramer served as an adjunct professor and then faculty course director in the Physician Assistant Program at Mercers College of Health Professions until 2010.
In 2009, Dr. Kramer received his PhD in Epidemiology from the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University and joined the faculty shortly thereafter. At Emory, Dr. Kramer received awards for excellence in research and teaching and published over 200 peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Kramer's research is grounded in epidemiology as a population health science, utilizing theories and perspectives from sociology, demography, and geography to understand how social processes and exposures are biologically embodied and shape population health patterns across the lifespan. At the heart of Dr. Kramer's research is how individuals and families interact with local and regional health, social, and economic systems to produce population health patterns.
Currently, Dr. Kramer is a population health scientist, social epidemiologist, and maternal and child health expert aiming to guide community leaders and policymakers in evidence-based program and policy efforts to improve health trajectories across the lifespan and advance health equity. His research focuses on the role of historical, economic, and cultural characteristics of rural communities in shaping health-related opportunities and experiences.
“I am honored and excited to join the Mercer family,” said Dr. Kramer, “and look forward to productive, impactful research and implementation collaborations with academic and community partners seeking to maximize health and health equity in rural Georgia.”
Since 2022, the Center for Rural Health and Health Disparities has been led by Interim Executive Director Dr. Jennifer Barkin and has successfully maintained grant funding for the South Georgia Healthy Start Program.
“Dr. Barkin has done an outstanding job running the center as interim director and will continue to manage the Healthy Start grant and other important work for MUSM and rural Georgia,” said Dr. Sumner. “We are grateful for her contributions in this role.”
About the Center for Rural Health and Health Disparities
Established as one of the first two rural-focused NIH Centers of Excellence in the nation, the Center for Rural Health and Health Disparities administers numerous programs to eliminate disparities in maternal and infant mortality, opioid overdose, and chronic disease. CRHHD's work is supported by NIH's National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration's (HRSA) Office of Rural Health Policy, and HRSA's Office of Maternal and Child Health.
About Mercer University School of Medicine (Macon, Savannah, Columbus, Valdosta)
Mercer University School of Medicine was founded in 1982 to educate physicians and medical professionals who meet the primary care and health care needs of rural and underserved areas of Georgia. Currently, more than 60% of graduates practice in Georgia, with more than 80% of them in rural and underserved areas of Georgia. Mercer medical students benefit from a problem-solving medical education program that provides early patient care experience. This academic environment fosters early development of clinical problem solving and instills in each student an appreciation of the place of basic medicine in the medical field. The school opened additional four-year MD campuses in Savannah in 2008 and Columbus in 2021, and a clinical campus in Valdosta in 2024. From the second year onwards, students participate in core clinical practicums at the school's main teaching hospitals, Atrium Health Navicent the Medical Center in Macon and Piedmont Macon Medical Center. Memorial Health University Medical Center in Savannah, Piedmont Columbus Regional Hospital and St. Francis Hospital in Columbus, and SGMC Health in Valdosta. The school also offers master's degrees in preclinical sciences and family therapy, and doctoral degrees in biomedical and rural health sciences.
