Salina ? Kyle Krehbiel has achieved something that few students have.

The Salina native is preparing to graduate from the Kansas University Medical Center School of Medicine with a perfect 4.0 grade point average.

“It is pretty uncommon for a student to make it all the way through while carrying a 4.0,” said Dr. Mark Meyer, associate dean of student affairs at the Med Center. “It takes a tremendous amount of effort because of the difficulty of all the material covered.”

Meyer said the grade point average “doesn’t just mean he’s good at book learning.”

“He’s also proved that he can communicate with patients and have the kind of interpersonal skills that a doctor needs to perfect.”

Krehbiel, 26, downplayed the accomplishment.

“It represents a lot of hard work, but it doesn’t mean I’m the smartest person in the world,” he said.

Krehbiel will intern for a year in the Kansas City area before starting his diagnostic radiology residency at Wake Forest University.

Despite Krehbiel’s perfect GPA, the residency was his second pick.

“People might think that’s odd since I’ve done pretty well, but there aren’t many spots for residents, especially in this field,” Krehbiel said. “I knew I would match somewhere, and I’m glad that it was Wake Forest, because they have a great program.

“For some reason, radiology became immensely popular among the top tier students this year, so I’m real pleased I got one of my top picks.”

Krehbiel has been interested in radiology, especially neuroradiology, for years.

“Now radiologists are treating aneurisms by inserting wires into the brain where before a surgeon would have had to cut open the skull,” Krehbiel said.

Krehbiel had considered following in his father’s footsteps into family practice medicine.

“I didn’t feel that I could be that smart,” he said. “There’s so much to know and do I didn’t think I could ever do it as well as my father.”

His father, Dr. Mark Krehbiel, disagrees.

“He’s about two times as smart as I am,” he said.