Urology services offered

When Dr. Larry Strong decided to move from his private urology practice in Chicago, he began to visit selected states where he thought he might like to relocate. When he got to Minnesota, he said, he canceled the rest of his tour. He had found the right place.

In 2004 Dr. Strong became a physician with the Fairview Mesaba Clinic-Hibbing. In June 2006, he also began offering urology services at Bigfork Valley.

It's important to be easily available, he believes. As people age, urology services are often needed - just when it becomes more difficult to travel long distances. By offering a clinic and surgical services close to home, problems can be taken care of rather than left untreated.

Distance from a specialist is one reason people choose to live with problems in the urinary or male systems, but another is not realizing that there are treatments available. There are solutions for incontinence, for example; it is not just a normal pattern of aging. A typical treatment for incontinence, Dr. Strong explained, may involve minor surgery as an outpatient.

To become a specialist surgeon requires an additional six years beyond medical school. Dr. Strong received his MD degree from Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tenn., then moved to Cook County Hospital in Chicago for his internship and residency in urology.

After completing his residency, Dr. Strong was in private practice in Chicago for 24 years before coming to Hibbing. Urology, he said, is still fascinating to him. On career day lectures in high schools he has invited the students to imagine a society where there is no concept of money. What, he asks, would they choose to do with their lives?

"For me," he said, "it's urology."

The medical specialty is a need across the nation right now. About 20 years ago the number of residency slots in urology were reduced, he explained. Now, as baby boomers age, there is a need for urologists at the same time that there are fewer trained physicians available.

But there are also promising advances on the horizon. Dr. Strong looks forward to successful results from current research into vaccines to prevent prostate cancer, better ways to treat incontinence and more choices in medicines to treat erectile dysfunction.

Today, however, he is working in a field he enjoys, and doing it in both a surgical and non-surgical clinic setting. And when he is not working? He's enjoying some new experiences -- like ice fishing, curling and taking in views of northland lakes from the deck of a pontoon.