Schweitzer Fellow bringing diabetes education to Cherokee youth
Tuesday, March 3, 2026
Media Contact: Kayley Spielbusch | Digital Communications Specialist | 918-561-5759 | kspielb@okstate.edu
Medical student and Cherokee Nation citizen Kyleigh Harrell is driven to serve her tribal community.
Harrell is a second-year medical student at OSU College of Osteopathic Medicine at the Cherokee Nation and a part of the Albert Schweitzer Fellowship 2025-26 Tulsa cohort.
She grew up in the small town of Roland, located on the Cherokee Nation Reservation in far eastern Oklahoma. She always knew she wanted to be a health care provider, but her decision was solidified after her little brother was in an ATV accident several years ago.
Her family didn’t have insurance at the time, and they had to drive two hours to the Cherokee Nation Emergency Center in Tahlequah, where they discovered a grade three splenic injury and internal bleeding.
“The bleed ended up clotting, and he was fine, but they life-flighted him to St. Francis Children’s Hospital in Tulsa. Essentially, they saved his life because normally those injuries don’t clot. It was kind of a miracle,” Harrell said.
Harrell credits Kelli Swank, a fourth-year medical student at OSU-COM CN, for leading her to OSU-COM and the Schweitzer Fellowship. They both attended Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, and Swank became a role model to Harrell.
After hearing about the Schweitzer Fellowship from Swank, Harrell attended an interest session and decided to apply for the program, seeing it as an opportunity to serve the tribal community.
The Albert Schweitzer Fellowship equips graduate and professional students with the leadership skills to address unmet health care needs. Tulsa is one of 13 program sites in the United States, as well as the national headquarters.
Harrell’s project came together after she connected with Hayden Kingfisher, a third-year medical student at OSU-COM CN and a member of the Albert Schweitzer Fellowship 2024-25 Tulsa cohort.
“Hayden had a project at the Cherokee Nation Immersion School, and he reached out to me because we have similar paths that we want to take with serving tribal communities,” Harrell said. “It was a combination of personal drive and my friends that led me to the program.”
Harrell coordinated with Kingfisher to take over his project at the Cherokee Nation Immersion School for her fellowship year, which aims to decrease diabetes rates among school-aged youth through education and health initiatives.
She primarily works with third through eighth graders at the Cherokee Nation Immersion School, which she visits two to three times a week.
During her visits, she discusses how diabetes affects the body and strategies for long-term prevention. She helped the students develop personal health goals and track their progress. She is also teaching them about the different organ systems and their functions.
Kingfisher said that by continuing his project, Harrell represents the core value of sustainability as a Schweitzer Fellow.
“The continuation of care within our communities ensures that our service remains real and impactful. As Cherokee citizens, Kyleigh and I hold to the concept of ‘Gadugi,’ the idea of working together for the good of the community,” Kingfisher said. “It was culturally enriching to see her step into this role, bringing both dedication and cultural resonance to this work.”
Cherokee Nation citizens experience a higher prevalence of diabetes than the general population. Over 55% of Harrell’s students have a family member with diabetes.
"A lot of Cherokee citizens have accepted [diabetes] as normalcy, and it's not. I
want to make sure the kids know that you don't have to grow up and get diabetes. The
youth are one of our most vulnerable populations, but also the most hopeful."
She said that educating the youth is the key to changing this statistic.
“A lot of Cherokee citizens have accepted it as normalcy, and it’s not. I want to make sure the kids know that you don’t have to grow up and get diabetes. It’s a chronic, preventable illness,” Harrell said. “The youth are one of our most vulnerable populations, but also the most hopeful.”
Along with her project sessions, she also assists with extracurricular activities at the Cherokee Nation Immersion School, including basketball practice.
Fostering these relationships with her students has helped her connect with her Cherokee heritage and has been one of her favorite parts of the experience.
“Growing up, I wasn’t super connected to Cherokee culture. The immersion school has given me an outlook on it that I didn’t have before,” Harrell said. “They’ve adopted me into their ways. They’re teaching me Cherokee, and I have a Cherokee name now.”
She aims to continue the project and hopes to see a shift in fewer diabetes diagnoses among Cherokee citizens. Her experience as a Schweitzer Fellow is something she will carry with her as a future physician serving her tribal community.
“Eventually, I’ll be seeing these people as my patients,” Harrell said. “Growing cultural competency and understanding the language, understanding why and how they do what they do. How can I be more ingrained than that?”