I first realized the potential benefit to both practice and academic institutions by linking them when I was a Field Professor of Community Health Sciences at the University of Kentucky and lived and taught medical students in Hazard, KY.  My local project was to join 6 county health departments into a regional department - the Kentucky River District Health Department - and I was employed both by the medical school and the health department.  I was then jointly recruited in 1976 by the then new Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine [now Northeast Ohio Medical University (NEOMED)] and the Akron Health Department to work in both and to "bring them more closely together."  The rest is history, I suppose.  We did develop a close working relationship in the areas of teaching, service and research, and I was paid partially by each organization.  The relationship was formalized in 1997.  On January 1, 2011, the Akron Health Department and the Barberton Health Department merged with the Summit County Health District and the formal association with NEOMED continues.  I am now a member of the Board of Health of the new organization.