Gang,
See my post under academic excellence and see how SELECTIVE this inaugural Med School class is…then…READ THIS!!!
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Since they got approval based upon placing their docs into rural America, I wonder how many came from rural America?
I thought it was mainly to place doctors around Houston but of course around Texas.
Their case to the Texas legislator was to fill the significant gaps in rural areas that have historically had large gaps in medical resources. I have wondered how they were going to ensure that their doctors that come out of the school were going to rural Texas. I figured their scholarships may have commitments to the rural communities. Interesting that a major urban area and school would plant their graduates in rural areas badly in need of more medical care.
If that is your goal, I would think they would draw more students from those areas where they may desire to go back to those areas.
In their statement it said:
The mission is to prepare primary care doctors and other needed physician specialties, such as psychiatry and general surgery, with a deep understanding of social determinants of health, to practice in underserved urban and rural communities —“filling the gap”where health disparities take the biggest toll. The goal is for 50% of graduates to choose primary care specialties including family medicine, general internal medicine and general pediatrics.
I thought this was their goal which is to go into the underserved areas whether it’s rural or urban.
Like you said, it wouldn’t make since to say you are serving only rural when you are an urban school.
That was Sam Houston State that got their medical school approved saying it would serve the rural areas.
The Sam Houston State University (SHSU) College of Osteopathic Medicine (COM) seeks to prepare students for the degree of Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine (DO) with an emphasis toward primary care and rural practice,
https://www.shsu.edu/academics/osteopathic-medicine/prospective-students/admissions.html
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Maybe initially it was focused on rural as they started their approval process for that was my memory and then they included urban down the stretch with their State of Texas approval process.
I still don’t know how they are going to ensure their graduates will go to those target zones.
The 50% primary care and inner city/rural emphasis is a nice goal, but it’ll be tough to achieve.
In the end, I’m guessing that once most of those grads realize how much more money they can make as a specialist in the Med Center, or something comparable, they‘ll go in that direction.
I think that’s probably an inevitably, but hopefully part of this classes accepting of scholarships and going forward is a commitment to working in the underserved parts of our state. And hopefully and decent percentage decide to stay in those communities.
But in the way of this world, typically the dollars will reign supreme either from financial obligations or because lots of money makes life easier in general.
The intent from the get go was to prepare medical students for undeserved areas, especially urban areas. That was the unique angle from the beginning - nothing has changed. Roughly 80% of Americans live in urban areas so just that alone means most would be prepared for urban areas. If you read about the curricular design it is purposely done to integrate the students into a unique pedagogical system best suited for urban areas (but applicable to rural ones). Spoke with Dr. Khator about this at length at an alumni meeting.
“The University of Houston aims to bring more primary care physicians to underserved urban areas while working to recruit future doctors from underrepresented groups, like African-Americans and Latinos. TCU-UNTHSC’s school has focused on ensuring an optimal student experience, creating a system of mentors or “coaches” — area physicians independent of the medical school who can guide students through their medical training.”
In addition to the physician coaches, they will be assigned to other (allied) health professionals in the city such as social workers, psychologists and pharmacists.
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The four years of Medical School has no specific area. It is the same education regardless of which school you go to. Then, in your Internship role you do specialty rotations. I assume, that is where UH will be different as the “rotation” will be to serve the under served. Then you do your Residency in an area, in this case, I assume it is Family Practice or Internal Medicine. What is to stop a UH Med Student from bolting after the initial four years of Med School?
As I said, there is nothing to stop them.
And I’m guessing that once they realize how much more money they can make in specialties in places like the Med Center…it’ll be tough to achieve the goals of inner city/rural commitment, and 50%+ primary care.
Traditionally, yes, but this program is designed differently to focus on specific urban needs.
LOL. Nobody will stop anyone from doing anything but money doesn’t drive EVERYTHING. I suspect many of these students applied to this program given its unique direction, in addition to, the tuition reduction and other reasons.
They could all quit and become Buddhist monks afterwards, but the program is designed in this specific way, whether you like it or not - which clearly seems to rub some people the WRONG way.
Oh don’t get me wrong.
I LIKE the way that the program is designed. That doesn’t rub me the wrong way at all.
Realistically though, I think they’ll have a tough time achieving their goals, for the reasons I mentioned above.
Too bad they didn’t get you as a consultant before they collectively designed this deeply flawed idea - you could’ve saved them millions of dollars and program that will be redesigned when it fails in a few years. Get your name in the hat now as the new Dean of the College!
No one says that the idea is flawed…it’ll just be difficult for it to achieve its goals; that’s the realist in me speaking.
If you’re arguing the projected outcomes for a program’s unique niche and contribution to the medical school landscape and establishment is flawed in its conception before it even begins, you’re saying it’s a flawed plan and design.
Who’s saying it’s flawed?
It may indeed be successful in achieving its goal.
But I’ll believe it when I see it.
In the end, I suspect that our med school grads won’t be that much different from the grads of other med schools, whatever the plan and goals might be, but we’ll see.
I won’t try and predict the future.
You are, but that’s okay. You’re entitled to your position.