Dr. Jerry Kruse joined the SIU School of Medicine faculty in 1984 and has served the organization in many leadership roles, including the past 10 years as dean and provost of Springfield-based Southern Illinois University School of Medicine and president and CEO of SIU Medicine, the medical school’s multispecialty group practice of doctors. Kruse has announced his plans to retire in August, although he said he doesn’t plan to leave Illinois.
Kruse and his wife, Lois, live in Springfield and Quincy. They have three daughters and three grandchildren. In his free time, Kruse enjoys golf, wine, trumpet and humorous poetry.
Where were you born and raised, and what was your first job?
I was born and raised in Salisbury, Missouri, a town about 100 miles east of Kansas City. My first job that ever paid me money was mowing yards. The second job was a warehouse worker for a chain grocery company.
Between my years in college, I was the recreational director for the Salisbury City Park, which meant I got to coach youth baseball and tennis, schedule the games, drag the field, get the umpires and all of that kind of stuff. It was actually my first teaching job, to tell you the truth.
What attracted you to the field of medicine?
I was a junior chemical engineering major at University of Missouri and at our fraternity the upperclassmen washed the dishes. I was washing with another guy, a psychology major, and he said to me, “Jerry, you ought to be a doctor.” Later that night I went to visit a high school classmate’s mother in the hospital. She was being treated for cancer, and as I was leaving the room she said, “Jerry, you know what? You should be a doctor.” Both in the same night. That’s when I began exploring it.
Regarding medical education, during my third year of residency at medical school we were obligated to give two grand rounds presentations that had to be thoroughly researched. After those grand rounds one of my residency mates came up and said, “Jerry, you really have a knack for this teaching. That should be a part of what you do.” Shortly thereafter I was offered a position in the Robert Wood Johnson Academic Family Medicine Fellowship at Mizzou that put an emphasis on the development of leadership skills, and it gave me a broad picture of education and public health.
How has the process of learning to be a physician changed over the course of your career?
In the past, there was a lot of information in textbooks that you had to find and read, and a lot of information came from lectures given to a large number of people. You learned clinical medicine in the third and fourth years, and those were very long hours of intense care for patients.
Things started to change about the time I was a medical student, from 1975 to 1979. There is now more information at your fingertips with electronic devices, but you have to be much more of an expert in determining what is good information. SIU School of Medicine taught every medical school in the nation, all 159 of them, that a different kind of education was better for medical students. There is much more learning in small groups with a tutor, and with standardized or simulated patients who simulate having a condition, and the students learn from that.
How can medical schools help address the shortage of medical professionals, especially in under-served areas?
We don’t have a health care system with the incentives to do that. Part of it relates to how we’re paid, the cost of medical education and who picks up the tab for that. Our students have a very high tuition and a lot of the decisions are made by for-profit companies in this country, which is not good for medical education at all.
Medical schools should be significant advocates lobbying for proper payment reform and the proper structure of the U.S. health care system so that these inequities do not appear. We’re one of the few countries in the industrialized world that has a problem of this magnitude.
Will technology ever advance to a degree that patients no longer need to see physicians in person?
No, it never will. As a matter of fact, it will probably make that need even greater. We embrace the idea that patients have more information, but they clearly need guidance in determining which information is effective and useful for them and which information is just plain garbage. Recent studies point out the need to have a relationship with your doctor as the complexity of medical care increases and some types of care for patients are shifted more toward them.
What are some new practices for certifying the medical profession?
Medical board certifying agencies are no longer giving one big test every 10 years, but smaller and more frequent tests with a few questions that are very difficult, but they allow you to use any source you need to get the answer. Those tests train you to use electronic means to quickly identify information you need.
What future trends do you see in medical education?
We are seeing interest once again from for-profit and large nonprofit corporations to become more involved in medical education than they have before. Just this year we’ve seen the first interest in the executive branch of the federal government becoming more directly involved in medical education with its interest in nutrition curricula.
There is probably going to be more education available from devices with more advisory roles from mentors and professors, which actually allows them to develop closer relationships with students as they move forward. You’ll also see more students getting involved in various types of research, and we should be able to reach more populations and do a better job with population-based medicine with the data and experiences that are being developed now.
What advice would you give to young people who are considering medicine as a career?
They will always have a good job. There’s no end in sight for the physician shortage. There are many types of things you can do with a medical degree. Many physicians may gravitate toward patient care but there are other opportunities in leadership, research, education and different fields that demand physician input. These opportunities will continue to grow with time.
Why is it important to give back to the community in which you reside and work?
In my fellowship I learned that physicians were among the three learned professions during the Middle Ages, the other two being clergymen and lawyers. There were five characteristics of professionals from that time that still resonate today. The first is a continued mastery of an extensive body of knowledge; second, teaching the next generation of professionals; third, keeping confidential relationships with your clients and fourth, understand that you might not be paid for a substantial portion of what you do.
The fifth characteristic is being a leader in your profession and your community. Physicians have a responsibility to use their skills to better their community. All of those who have this type of opportunity for learning and contact with people should be leaders who make the world a better pace.
What might people be surprised to know about you?
I don’t think that most people know that I write humorous poetry and like to do a little stand-up comedy sometimes. I like jokes and being light-hearted. Most people around me get to know that pretty quickly.
Can you tell us a favorite joke?
Most of my favorite jokes are lawyer jokes, and I’ll leave it at that.
This article appears in April SBJ 2026.