Four new medical schools contribute to increase in first-year enrollment – MedCity Morning Read, Oct. 21, 2009

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WASHINGTON, D.C. – Medical school enrollment rose by 2 percent this year, thanks, in part, to four new medical schools, according to data released Tuesday by the Association of American Medical Colleges.

From 2008 to 2009, first-year enrollment rose from 18,036 to 18,390. Those students came from an applicant pool of 42,269, the data (pdf) shows.

The new schools that seated their first classes this year are: FIU Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine in Miami, Florida; The Commonwealth Medical College in Scranton, Pennsylvania; Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center Paul L. Foster School of Medicine in El Paso; and the University of Central Florida College of Medicine in Orlando. They welcomed a total of 189 medical students.

Twelve other schools also contributed to the enrollment increase by expanding their class sizes by 7 percent or more, according to the AAMC. At the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine, first-year enrollment jumped nearly 21 percent – from 86 students in 2008 to 104 in 2009.

Sarah Latson

Sarah Latson covers topics including medical education and research for MedCity News. She is a lecturer in journalism at Fairleigh Dickinson University’s College at Florham in Madison, N.J. Previously, she worked as a medical reporter at The Plain Dealer. Sarah has a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University and a bachelor’s degree in history from Colgate University.

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This article omits mention of osteopathic medical education, one of the fastest-growing sectors in U.S. medical education. U.S. osteopathic medical schools now account for one-sixth of the nationâ€™s accredited medical schools.

2009 applications to osteopathic medical colleges hit record levels for the third year in a row. More than 12,600 potential medical students applied for this yearâ€™s 4,933 osteopathic medical college seats, an increase of 7.5 percent over 2008. The total osteopathic medical college applicant pool has been increasing for seven years, and applications for the 2010 entering class are on track to continue this trend. To date, 2010 applications again are up by 7.5 percent over this time last year.

First-year enrollment at the nationâ€™s 25 colleges of osteopathic medicine jumped to nearly 5,000 this year, a 7.3 percent increase over fall 2008. Today, more than 17,000 students, or nearly one in five of all U.S. medical students, are studying in an osteopathic medical school.

The education osteopathic medical (DO) students receive is rigorous and thorough. Like their allopathic (MD) counterparts, incoming DO students are required to have strong undergraduate science backgrounds, have excellent Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) scores, and meet stringent admissions criteria. Also like their allopathic counterparts, osteopathic medical students participate in years of classroom, clinical, internship, and residency training. And when they leave that training, they become board-certified physicians, licensed to practice the full scope of medicine in every state in the country.

Comment by AACOM — October 22, 2009 @ 9:20 am