New medical schools in the US and its impact on med students

[Mithril]

I've been hearing that many new schools are in the early and late stages of accreditation in the US: http://www.lcme.org/newschoolprocess.htm

I was just wondering how American pre-meds and med students and those planning to apply to American schools feel about this. As far as I know, there hasn't been an increase in the number of post-graduate residency spots.

Teach a Canadian who has an interest in your medical school politics.

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[TooMuchResearch]

US residency spots still greatly out number US med school grads. As the number of US grads increases, FMGs trying to get US residency spots will feel more of a squeeze. I guess this could mean more US bred and raised primary care docs, but I think we should continue to import foreign talent.

 

[WorldChanger36]

As TooMuchResearch was saying, new schools are ok as long as there is a good place to going after med school. We need new medical schools very baddly. The physician shortage is only getting worse and more schools increases the chances of getting into medical school. The accreditation process is gulag of difficult and expencive tasks so I doubt that any yahoo is going to slide in a start their very own medical school( M.D) with out it be at least some what of a good school. The only real worry the students have with these new schools is if they fail to get full acreditation before students graduate, they could be SOL and have to start all over but this is very unlikely as I doubt a school would let this happen because of the consequences. Over all we need the schools so it is a good thing and so is the accreditation process. I like to hear a school has to work at least as hard as I do.

 

[as good as in]

This is going to be terrible for SGU, AUC, and Ross.

 

[Eric01]

Time to do some approximations. Over the next two years it looks like there will be 15 or so new medical schools opening. That's roughly 1000 new seats. Approximate 43000 applicants and now about 26000 seats. That means 60% of applicants will be accepted. Of course that's assuming the number of applicants doesn't rise much and this is for next year's cycle.

 

[CodeBlu]

Applicant numbers are most likely going to go down.

The economy will come out of the slump, and then people will stop applying to med school. When the economy is rough, the application numbers to medical schools increases drastically.

It's quite interesting to look at the AMCAS chart about applicants, matriculants over the years. Huge dips.

 

[Web MD]

It's comforting to know that it takes the economy being in the ****ter for applications in medicine to spike, and that the only constants have been declining reimbursement and rising tuition

 

[CodeBlu]

It's comforting to know that it takes the economy being in the ****ter for applications in medicine to spike, and that the only constants have been declining reimbursement and rising tuition

Tuition is out of control. No way should medical school cost upwards of 40,50K.... but alas here we are. Big bills to pay to SERVE humanity. Anyone that hates on doctors for making too much money, clearly hasn't gone through the process of training to become one.

 

[Web MD]

Already training myself to hate other professions harder so that when the day comes, I can win a shouting contest with a generic employee from the corporate world

 

[upchurch]

Applicant numbers are most likely going to go down.

The economy will come out of the slump, and then people will stop applying to med school. When the economy is rough, the application numbers to medical schools increases drastically.

It's quite interesting to look at the AMCAS chart about applicants, matriculants over the years. Huge dips.

if the economy ever gets out of this gutter

 

[Eric01]

if the economy ever gets out of this gutter

Ya I was going to say it looks like the economy is going to get worse without a qe3 and reduced gov spending with higher taxes and possible european troubles

 

[RogueUnicorn]

Tuition is out of control. No way should medical school cost upwards of 40,50K.... but alas here we are. Big bills to pay to SERVE humanity. Anyone that hates on doctors for making too much money, clearly hasn't gone through the process of training to become one.

but neither have you, not yet. also, before hyperventilating about serving humanity, maybe we should step off the pedestal.

 

[gravitywave]

Time to do some approximations. Over the next two years it looks like there will be 15 or so new medical schools opening. That's roughly 1000 new seats. Approximate 43000 applicants and now about 26000 seats. That means 60% of applicants will be accepted. Of course that's assuming the number of applicants doesn't rise much and this is for next year's cycle.

your math is half-cocked. i count six new M.D. schools in the pipeline that aren't already accepting students (FAU, Phoenix, etc) or that aren't going to be opening (Palm Beach). by 2014 we should have around 19,500 M.D. matriculants with expanding class sizes at existing schools; the acceptance rate will still be <50% unless we see a drastic drop in applicant volume.

if you're including D.O. applicants, you can't really, as it's not the same applicant pool.

This is going to be terrible for SGU, AUC, and Ross.

yep. and they've been expanding class sizes lately, too. i think the squeeze will come for the non-citizen IMGs first, though. and the DOs will continue to match more competitively, and in greater numbers. academic medicine's stigma against them drops away a little more every year.

many of these new LCME seats will go into primary care however - you can see the numbers creeping back up for US seniors going into FM.

upshot is that in the past 10 years you've seen a lot of FM/IM docs from Pakistan, India, Phillippines, Europe... that's going to become a thing of the past as those slots are taken by DOs and LCME MDs instead.

 

[Eric01]

your math is half-cocked. i count six new M.D. schools in the pipeline that aren't already accepting students (FAU, Phoenix, etc) or that aren't going to be opening (Palm Beach). by 2014 we should have around 19,500 M.D. matriculants with expanding class sizes at existing schools; the acceptance rate will still be <50% unless we see a drastic drop in applicant volume.

if you're including D.O. applicants, you can't really, as it's not the same applicant pool.



yep. and they've been expanding class sizes lately, too. i think the squeeze will come for the non-citizen IMGs first, though. and the DOs will continue to match more competitively, and in greater numbers. academic medicine's stigma against them drops away a little more every year.

many of these new LCME seats will go into primary care however - you can see the numbers creeping back up for US seniors going into FM.

upshot is that in the past 10 years you've seen a lot of FM/IM docs from Pakistan, India, Phillippines, Europe... that's going to become a thing of the past as those slots are taken by DOs and LCME MDs instead.

I am including do schools and its relatively safe to assume majority of do app
licants are also md applicants, although they probably have a much smaller overall pool due to not all md applicants applying do. Including them is pertinent sine they are equivalent medical professionals

 

[Wolfman89]

Already training myself to hate other professions harder so that when the day comes, I can win a shouting contest with a generic employee from the corporate world

Just compare your salary to a salary of an oil company CEO or a trial lawyer.

if the economy ever gets out of this gutter

Ya I was going to say it looks like the economy is going to get worse without a qe3 and reduced gov spending with higher taxes and possible european troubles

I figure the worst that will happen is that we will experience something akin to a "Lost Decade" that Japan experienced in the 1990's. So IMO worst case scenario we come out of the economic slump by 2020.

 

[Web MD]

Just compare your salary to a salary of an oil company CEO or a trial lawyer.

Figure I'll let the patients compare in the future so I get that imaginary million dollar bump in salary

 

[Wolfman89]

Figure I'll let the patients compare in the future so I get that imaginary million dollar bump in salary

Now only if it was a real bump. lol

 

[sector9]

The only real worry the students have with these new schools is if they fail to get full acreditation before students graduate, they could be SOL and have to start all over but this is very unlikely as I doubt a school would let this happen because of the consequences. Over all we need the schools so it is a good thing and so is the accreditation process. I like to hear a school has to work at least as hard as I do.

This is NOT a real worry. Schools have shut down before, and the LCME has always disbursed the students among other MD schools. I've read this same scare tactic several times on SDN and it is wrong every time.

See here http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showpost.php?p=11134987&postcount=22

 

[gravitywave]

I am including do schools and its relatively safe to assume majority of do app
licants are also md applicants, although they probably have a much smaller overall pool due to not all md applicants applying do. Including them is pertinent sine they are equivalent medical professionals

cool beans, but how many of the 13,000 DO applicants are you planning on including in your analysis?

per aacom.org the answer should be about 67%. the overall acceptance rate between MD and DO was 49% in 2010. it won't hit 60% in the next two years unless we see a substantial fall-off in volume to both types of schools. and there are certainly not 26k seats available for the c/o 2016.

I wasn't counting new DO schools in the six that I saw, I'm not familiar with their expansion plans.

just trying to infuse some rigor, is all

 

[Eric01]

Since 2010 there has and will be aggressive growth in seats. Maybe it wont get as high as 60% but that really depends on the application numbers. In 2010 there were 18665 md seats. AAMC is predicting 19525 seats in 2012 cycle. In 2010 there were 5031 seats in 2012 cycle there will be 6000 or so seats. This reprsents a total change of 7.7% in total seats. Now willapplicants go up or down is the main question I presume it will remainrelatively static at current levels

 

[unhappytnt]

Stupid question, but does this recent surge in the opening of new medical schools have anything to do with the healthcare reform? With the predicted physician shortages and all one would think the government is pushing for new schools.

 

[Eric01]

Stupid question, but does this recent surge in the opening of new medical schools have anything to do with the healthcare reform? With the predicted physician shortages and all one would think the government is pushing for new schools.

I don't believe so, the AAMC called for an increase in medical school enrollment of 30% by 2015 back in 2006, well before the healthcare bill was being talked about

 

[medschool2016]

Ok what does it mean the schools like Hofstra has "Preliminary Accreditation"? I am hesitant to apply/go somewhere that is not 100% accredited.

 

[Web MD]

But you'll get a sick financial aid package

 

[Mithril]

Ok what does it mean the schools like Hofstra has "Preliminary Accreditation"? I am hesitant to apply/go somewhere that is not 100% accredited.

It means they're in the process of full accreditation. If there were a significant chance that the school wouldn't be able to meet the standards set by the LCME, then they wouldn't be able to recruit students.

 

[Law2Doc]

I've been hearing that many new schools are in the early and late stages of accreditation in the US: http://www.lcme.org/newschoolprocess.htm

I was just wondering how American pre-meds and med students and those planning to apply to American schools feel about this. As far as I know, there hasn't been an increase in the number of post-graduate residency spots.

Teach a Canadian who has an interest in your medical school politics.

There are about 16000 to 18000 US seniors and about 25000 residency slots. There is room to expand and still give everyone a spot.

 

[pfaction]

Now you know how pharmacists feel--too many graduates, too little spots.

Congratulations!!

 

[pancakesyrup]

This is going to be terrible for SGU, AUC, and Ross.

Indeed. The Caribbean is no longer the viable fall-back option that it once was, and pretty soon anyone who gets an undesirable FM residency will be among the lucky ones.

It is a zero sum game. When the number of extra residencies decreases by half, it will have a profound impact on all IMGs, let alone the ones who are perceived as unable to be accepted to a US medical school.

 

[Beta Cell]

but neither have you, not yet. also, before hyperventilating about serving humanity, maybe we should step off the pedestal.

Perhaps you should heed a bit of your own advice. Every single one of your posts make me think you're a bitter fool.

 

[typicalindian]

I think it will help to bring I more us based docs since at the hospital I'm currently shadowing I met a lot of the residents are not from us med schools

 

[LizzyM]

Currently we have millions of uninsured Americans with very limited access to health care. The expectation is that health care reform will give those folks a health insurance card they can use to access a provider. The concern is that there will not be enough providers to meet the demand for services (there is also a concern that there will not be enough money to cover the demand but that's a topic for another day).

As has been mentioned, grown in the number of US grads is going to reduce the number of residency slots for International Medical Graduates which in turn will make the Carribbean schools far less attractive to US students and also limit the number of immigrant physicians who can land residency slots here.

Accreditation is usually provisional until the first class has graduated. What is that school in the Bronx that graduated its first class this year and received accreditation about 10 days before... that's what I'm talking about.

Is the increasing number of slots going to make it easier for US applicants? It depends on whether the new schools are friendly to OOS applicants and whether applicants want to go to unknown schools with little name recognition. For those that want to go to a big name school, the new schools won't help much.

 

[Charles Darwin]

How long does it generally take for a school to reach full accreditation from "Applicant School" status? Also, shouldn't the new medical school opening in Pittsburgh be listed as an "Applicant School"?

 

[TribalSeeds]

Currently we have millions of uninsured Americans with very limited access to health care. The expectation is that health care reform will give those folks a health insurance card they can use to access a provider. The concern is that there will not be enough providers to meet the demand for services (there is also a concern that there will not be enough money to cover the demand but that's a topic for another day).

Adding about 40 million new people into a healthcare system is some of the worst policy I've ever seen. The system is screwed.