A joint program between two Oklahoma universities will be aimed at addressing a shortage of physicians in the state.
The University of Oklahoma and the University of Tulsa announced Tuesday that they will collaborate on a four-year community medical education program to be based in Tulsa. The program will expand on the School of Community Medicine established at the University of Oklahoma's Tulsa campus last year following a $50 million gift from the George Kaiser Family Foundation.
Officials hope classes in the new program can begin in the fall of 2014.
"We rank near the bottom of all the states in the number of medical physicians per population, so we need more physicians," University of Oklahoma President David Boren said. "And also many of our physicians are retiring and so on and so forth, so we really need a new infusion of more physicians and then especially we need to get more into these underserved areas."
Boren said the program is in a planning stage that could take 12 to 18 months and is "not something that you just say it today and do it tomorrow." The schools will look at similar partnerships between Florida Atlantic University and the University of Miami and between the University of Notre Dame and Indiana University as they design the program.
"Through this collaboration, we seek to effect real and dramatic gains in the health of Oklahomans," University of Tulsa President Steadman Upham said. "The vision for this program is to produce physicians with a focus on community health, to address the social aspect of disease and wellness and to create equitable access to care for all Oklahomans. Our aim is to keep these doctors right here at home — living and working in Oklahoma's communities."
Recipients of scholarships would be required to make a five-year commitment to work in underserved areas of Oklahoma, such as north Tulsa. The University of Oklahoma is already planning a specialty health center in the area, named after former Sooners basketball star and Tulsa native Wayman Tisdale.
Boren said the program is envisioned as having 50 to 75 new students per year, for a total of 200 to 300 studying at one time. Their focus would be in areas such as preventive health and early childhood development.
"It wouldn't be a medical school that would attempt to develop a whole comprehensive range of medical research," Boren said. "Its main focus is on community service and not medical research. But there are areas of medical research, some of them linked to clinical practice in underserved areas, that will be undertaken."
The universities already work together to train physician assistants and to perform research in areas including cancer and neurosciences. Boren said the partnership will be a cost-effective way to train more doctors by cutting down on the number of new faculty and facilities that would otherwise be needed.
"I think it's very important that a state our size, with our resources that we do not duplicate programs to create unnecessary expense," Boren said. "We simply do not have the resources to afford duplication."
Still, Boren said the creation and growth of the program will depend partially on state tax revenues for funding and "that may slow us down for two or three years."
Boren said students would typically do their undergraduate work at the University of Tulsa, which does not have a medical school, before doing their clinical work at the University of Oklahoma's medical center in Tulsa. OU also operates a Health Sciences Center in Oklahoma City.
"I would say what will likely happen over time is those students who start in Tulsa will go on through to four years in Tulsa. Those who start in Oklahoma City will primarily go on through to four years in Oklahoma City, but there will still be the opportunity in cases where it's appropriate for them to go back and forth," Boren said.
"There will always probably be some students that will start one place and end up the other."