NWHSU grad elected to Idaho State legislature, awarded Chiropractor of the Year

NWHSU grad Greg Ferch, D.C. (1993) was elected to the Idaho State legislature in 2020. Dr. Ferch brings his background as a chiropractor to the position, serving on the Business and Health and Welfare committees. In part because of this contribution to the profession, he was awarded Chiropractor of the Year at the Idaho Association of Chiropractic Physicians 2021 Annual Convention. This is the second time he has been granted this award. 

When Dr. Ferch was young, his father drove him 52 miles one-way to see a chiropractor. “I would go in there feeling like I could hardly walk,” he explained, “and after I got an adjustment it impressed on me how cool that was.” 

This experience made him confident that chiropractic was the path from him, and as he started high school, Dr. Ferch sent for the NWHSU catalog to investigate the curriculum. In his senior year, he enlisted in the Army Reserve. He attended the University of North Dakota where he received a BS in Biology with an emphasis in the pre-health sciences. He stayed an extra year and took additional business and chemistry courses. In addition, he was a teaching assistant in cadaver labs for two years. Then he moved to Bloomington to start at NWHSU in 1989.

In January 1991, during his fifth semester, Dr. Ferch was pulled out of his radiology course to take a phone call. He was being activated for Desert Storm. The summer before, he had been promoted to staff sergeant.  As an army medic in San Antonio working in a level-one trauma center, he saw every kind of trauma, and impressed doctors with what he had learned in chiropractic school. 

Dr. Ferch served 100 days on active duty, worked a 12-hour shift, got in the car and drove back to Minneapolis from San Antonio. He arrived on Saturday night and started back at school Monday morning. When he graduated and his original plans to buy a practice in Northern Idaho  fell through, he bought a practice in Boise Idaho, site unseen. He ended up buying a home and converting it into an office. Twenty eight years later, he still practices there. 

Dr. Ferch always had an interest in politics, and when he saw that chiropractors like himself were being reimbursed by a major insurer at the same rate as twenty years ago, he felt compelled to get involved. He plans to be a strong voice in the legislature, leaning on his chiropractic background. As he says, “My chiropractic education doesn’t take a backseat to anybody.”

Dr. Ferch joins three other NWHSU chiropractors who serve or have served as state lawmakers, all of whom worked on various human services committees: Dr. Jim Abeler (Minnesota House of Representatives 1998-2016, Minnesota State Senate 2016-present), Dr. Scott Munsterman (Mayor of the City of Brookings 2003-2009, South Dakota House of Representatives 2011-2016), and Dr. Fred Deutsch (South Dakota State House of Representatives 2015-present).