Published: November 18, 2008 11:37 pm         

Physician giving back

Longtime Enid physician Dr. David Russell has created a way to help aspiring doctors reach their goal.

His donation of $60,000 to the Oklahoma State University Medical Cowboys will fund the David Russell, M.D., OSU Medical Cowboys Endowed Scholarship, which will support an annual scholarship of $2,500.

The scholarship is Russell’s way of contributing to his profession, showing pride in his alma mater and supporting incoming generations of health care providers.

“I think we all have an obligation and responsibility to do things to help young people,” Russell said. “People helped me and I want to repay that and help others have the same great experience as I did.

“I think OSU is a great university and I like the thought of being a part of helping OSU grow. Re-gardless of the field, OSU is a great place to start.”

OSU Medical Cowboys was created by Dr. Barry Pollard, who also practices in Enid, as a way to fund a $3 million scholarship endowment for support of OSU students entering any health care profession. As a 1973 premed graduate from OSU, Pollard felt his OSU education left him prepared for medical school and wanted to promote and help other high school students receive the same opportunity he did.

Pollard asked Russell to sit on the board of OSU Medical Cowboys, and Russell learned of the organization’s goals and mission and saw a cause he wanted to support.

“Barry told me there was something going on at OSU that I might be interested in and told me I should come down and see what it was all about,” Russell said. “It was definitely something I was interested in and could wholeheartedly support.”

And according to Russell, OSU, the students and the health care professions are not the only benefactors of his gift.

“This is one of those things that if you get involved and participate, you will get so much more out of it,” he said. “It comes back to you tenfold through a sense of satisfaction and being a part of OSU.”

Ever since Russell can remember, he wanted to be a doctor.

He graduated from Enid High School in 1956 and enrolled at OSU. After three years at OSU, he was accepted into the University of Oklahoma’s School of Medicine, where he graduated in 1963.

In 1964, while interning at St. John’s Hospital in Tulsa, Russell was notified of his impending military obligation and that he would be drafted on completion of his internship. He applied for and received a commission into the Air Force and spent the next 13 years as a flight surgeon, caring for military pilots and their families.

As his military tour was coming to a close, Russell began considering his next career move and decided to pursue specialty training in radiology through a residency at Wilford Hall Air Force hospital in San Antonio. As payback for the radiology training he received, Russell was assigned to Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth, Texas, for three years. He left the Air Force in 1977, returned to his hometown and began practicing radiology with Dr. Dan Mitchell.

In talking about his time serving in the Air Force, Russell said, “I’ve never had an assignment I didn’t enjoy.”

For the past 30 years Russell has worked to build a successful practice in Enid. As retirement nears, he began looking to his next assignment: helping pave the way for the next generation entering the health care field.