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Ill put a twenty spot wager that the affiliate is gonna be John C Lincoln and its Family practice residency.
Any takers?
Question about class size increase at AZCOM
Started by GaryPham
Ill put a twenty spot wager that the affiliate is gonna be John C Lincoln and its Family practice residency.
Any takers?
I think the phrase "LOL" is appropriate here. Or maybe "ROTFLMAO".
Here's what AZCOM is thinking: $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$, as in an extra $16 million over 4 years per class.
This is just not true. UofA has had a "Downtown Phoenix" campus for many years (long before they opened their UofA Phoenix Medical campus). The Downtown Phoenix campus allowed 3rd and 4th year students to do their coursework and rotations in Phoenix, they are well established in the area, more so than AZCOM is.
UofA and AZCOM are very much in competition for spots, a few years back Gov. Napolitano had to intervene and threatened to withdrawl state funding to hospitals who refused AZCOM students because of a preference for UofA students.
Probably. It would still be a step up from all the preceptor based FM rotations.
Don't believe the hype.
AZCOM had three things going for it:
1. A good student body. Smart, hardworking people who went the extra mile to assure themselves a good clinical education (mainly by rotating out).
2. A flexible rotation set-up. This is now gone the way of the dinosaurs.
3. A reasonably good faculty/didactic education (aka years 1-2).
#1 is in jeopardy because they'll expanding the class size, while the elimination of #2 reduces the opportunities available for the student body. #3 will be stretched by jacking up the class to 250.
As for the 500 bed hospitals, there are only a few options available in the valley that could fit the bill as a major teaching affiliate. (And by the way, I doubt that AZCOM will ever be able to coax these hospitals into taking large amounts of students, especially because they refuse to pay for rotations.)
Good Sam/VA - already affiliated with U of A. Takes a small amount of AZCOM students already, how many more can they take?
Maricopa - Also takes some students, not much room to expand.
Desert Sam - A huge hospital, but it's private, not a teaching hospital.
John C Lincoln North Mountain - also private. Even the JCL Fam Practice residents have a sticky time doing some rotations there. I doubt they open their arms to AZCOM (especially for free).
Mayo - It's Mayo. No dice for AZCOM.
St. Joe's - see the comment for Mayo. It ain't happening here. And besides, they take U of A students.
As for the non-profit thing, it's true that AZCOM is non-profit. But Midwestern University isn't. And besides, it's a joke to think that in today's America non-profit really means non-profit. And even if they were non-profit, doesn't it bother you that they'll charge you over 40K a year, in return for a decent year 1/2 and then some crappy preceptor-based rotations?
AZCOM being "THE health school of the West and one of the most prominent health profession schools in the country" is a sick joke.
Look, I liked going to AZCOM. I have a lot of good friends from my time there, and the degree I received is a means to nice end. But please, please go to AZCOM with your eyes wide open. Don't believe the same empty promises they've been throwing around for at least 10 years. Don't believe anything until you see it out of AZCOM.
The only bigger joke is COCA. Obviously AZCOM is not worried wbout their approval. Has COCA ever disapproved anything? Instead of going along with this idiocy, COCA should immediately put AZCOM on academic probation, maybe that would wake up our schools. Does anyone blame the larger medical community for thinking DO schools are inferior to the MD?
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ Ka-ching!!!!!!!!
I'm narrowed down between the pod programs at Des Moines University and AZCOM. As you may know, the pod students take the full basic sciences with the DO students at AZCOM (one year of basic science plus pharm at DMU). I was kind of shocked with the increase in class size at Arizona. It appears to be 250 DO students and 35 DPM students this upcoming year. I know from my interview they are building up like crazy but it did not seem possible to fit all these students. The anatomy lab seemed quite small for the current student body. From what I was told, a lot of students have to share a cadaver right now and there is a number of sessions per week to fit everyone. Do you guys think this class size increase is feasible???? How is the situation now?
Thanks
Thanks
The anatomy situation depends on how you look at it. They used to dissect twice a week here, now we only dissect once a week. I would take NOT dissecting any more than humanly possible, any day of the week. You can go into the lab any time you want; it's not like having more people on a cadaver limits your possibilities. Then again, I'm not trying to "hone" my "surgical" skills (trust me, anatomy lab is not the place you'll want to do that anyway).
There are lots of things about the school I gripe about - it would be inhuman not to - but the absolute least of my worries is how much time I have in gross lab.
There are lots of things about the school I gripe about - it would be inhuman not to - but the absolute least of my worries is how much time I have in gross lab.
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👍👍👍 Agreed. There is plenty of gross lab time between independent study and the weekly sessions. The labs themselves are usually not as helpful as you would imagine... You dont learn much about the sacral plexus by spending time removing fascia and dissecting fat (80% of the lab work). Most of the identification and gross stuff I learn is on the weekends or at night.
And just to throw in my two cents, we've been told they're suppose to be building a new lab or expanding the old lab. Besides, don't most schools have a lot of people that sharing a body? I was pretty sure I heard that at a lot of my interviews, but on the other hand that feels like it was years ago so I could be remembering wrong. Regardless, I kinda like it.
When did this profession choose money, profits and influence over quality, education and patient care? Pathetic.
The University of CA schools are already the most reputable medical school systems, not only in the west, but also the whole nation.
What makes you think Midwestern can surpass UC, especially in the West, where most of the UC power base is? If they wanted to be at the forefront of medicine, they could invest in research, because that is where most recognition comes from, not just from sheer graduate numbers. This sounds like what the Caribbean schools are doing: dramatically increasing class size to rake in profit. I heard RossU has like 450 students each per their 3 semesters of incoming classes. So a total of new 1350 students a year
OUt of those 450 a LARGE percentage of people are weeded out by the rigorous didactic gauntlet.
I know..but everyone knows caribbean schools are money/diploma mills....why is azcom forcing us to see them in that image now?
It's not about the money... at least not primarily. 100 extra students @ $40,000/year = $4 million/year, which is peanuts at a school the size of Midwestern, believe me. They sold their CCOM-affiliated hospital a few years ago for hundreds of millions of dollars and that, plus bonds, is what's paying for the expansion of the AZCOM campus, not this trivial bit of tuition. There is already a large (and expensive) support staff at Midwestern, just as there is at every other school, with financial aid, accounts receivable, counseling, student affairs, housing, janitorial, on and on. They will undoubtedly be hiring more staff to accommodate larger numbers of students. And, you know, all those buildings they're putting up are not going to cost $4 million or $16 million, probably closer to $100 million.
AZCOM is expanding its medical school not for the money but to meet a need for more primary care physicians. Obviously, the bigger you are, the more influence and power you have, so AZCOM is going to want to graduate more and more people and thus increase its alumni population. This is a natural thing to want to do, and the country and Arizona in particular could really use more primary care people, which osteopathic grads tend to go into. So let's not wallow in our cynicism to the point where we lose sight of the forest.
There are constant questions regarding the anatomy lab and other facilities (e.g., OMM lab) which are at capacity now with 159 medical students plus 35 pods in most of the same classes. Obviously these facilities need to be replaced with larger ones. It seems unlikely that these questions were overlooked by the folks planning the expansion, doesn't it?
I suspect that the primary concern of students entering AZCOM should be not the facilities but the prospect of effective rotations in the 3rd and 4th years. 4th year rotations can be out of state, so the main concern is really 3rd year. As has been exhaustively discussed in previous threads in this forum, one of AZCOM's distinctive qualities is the ability of students to design their own rotation schedule that is more suitable than the cookie-cutter default schedule we are handed by the administration. This is good for independent types, bad for people who just want to be taken care of. Obviously the key to a successful career at AZCOM is to go to every open house in town and network with physicians and program directors, so that you can get yourself set up with some good rotation spots later on.
They put a dean in charge of AZCOM who was previously involved with the legislature, advocating for more residency positions for AZCOM. We all hope of course that her influence and contacts with the government will make a difference. As for unpaid rotations, as I understand it AZCOM does indeed pay for rotations. I have heard $4000/month and other numbers on this forum and I am not sure what they pay, but the idea that some physician's office would offer clerkship positions free of charge is rather suspect.
AZCOM is expanding its medical school not for the money but to meet a need for more primary care physicians. Obviously, the bigger you are, the more influence and power you have, so AZCOM is going to want to graduate more and more people and thus increase its alumni population. This is a natural thing to want to do, and the country and Arizona in particular could really use more primary care people, which osteopathic grads tend to go into. So let's not wallow in our cynicism to the point where we lose sight of the forest.
There are constant questions regarding the anatomy lab and other facilities (e.g., OMM lab) which are at capacity now with 159 medical students plus 35 pods in most of the same classes. Obviously these facilities need to be replaced with larger ones. It seems unlikely that these questions were overlooked by the folks planning the expansion, doesn't it?
I suspect that the primary concern of students entering AZCOM should be not the facilities but the prospect of effective rotations in the 3rd and 4th years. 4th year rotations can be out of state, so the main concern is really 3rd year. As has been exhaustively discussed in previous threads in this forum, one of AZCOM's distinctive qualities is the ability of students to design their own rotation schedule that is more suitable than the cookie-cutter default schedule we are handed by the administration. This is good for independent types, bad for people who just want to be taken care of. Obviously the key to a successful career at AZCOM is to go to every open house in town and network with physicians and program directors, so that you can get yourself set up with some good rotation spots later on.
They put a dean in charge of AZCOM who was previously involved with the legislature, advocating for more residency positions for AZCOM. We all hope of course that her influence and contacts with the government will make a difference. As for unpaid rotations, as I understand it AZCOM does indeed pay for rotations. I have heard $4000/month and other numbers on this forum and I am not sure what they pay, but the idea that some physician's office would offer clerkship positions free of charge is rather suspect.
Do that consecutively over the next 4 years and that is an extra $16,000,000/year for all 4 year students in tuition. Keep in mind all the other cost they make money on such as housing. We can round that to $20,000.000/year for 4 years. Do that to CCOM too in the future and that is extra $40,000,000. That is quite a bit of money there
Preceptor based rotations are ok but remember that a private practice office based physician is not going to be motivated to teach you. They need to keep the office running. Whats nice about going to large hospitals is that RESIDENTS TEACH YOU. My opinion.
Increasing class size to meet the need for primary care docs? Ok...whatever. What if you don't want to be a family doc or an IM dude. Guess the lack of guidance or motivation (mainly by your peers) to land some rocken clinicals and get good letters just SCREWED ya.
Listen. Bottom line is you need to be at a teaching hospital to get the most out of your clinical experience. Sick people go to hospitals. You need to learn how to manage em. Sure you'll get there during intern year once you get your a$$ handed to ya for 6 months. Or maybe, you won't get there.
The school knows this because people BITCH ABOUT IT EVERY YEAR. Nothing has changed. 4th year is not my concern. It was great at AZCOM. BUt 3rd year was tough. I was all over the midwest in order to be at teaching hospitals. Why does that need to happen when there are SO MANY HOSPITALS in downtown phoenix which have residencies?
AZCOM has never greased the wheels politically or financially with those large hospitals. I don't care how many health fares you go to man, it won't make up for not putting in some serious effort on your part.
I'm happy with my education. However AZCOM could have made it infinitely easier to achieve without all the assloads of paperwork, traveling, phone calls, and financial burden I had to endure in order to be on par with folks who have large affiliated teaching hospitals.
Just my opinion.
it is b/c hospitals don't get paid to take on the students from midwestern. almost any other school has to pay to send its' students out
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Whoops
yep...what else can they expect after refusing to pay? only private practice dr's who are trying to get a tax deduction or some federal benefits
I find it hard that they dont pay anything. They probably dont pay as much as U of A is paying but they will pay something.
On his Blog, Dr. Ajluni said AZCOM presented clear testimony as to how they were fully prepared for the class expansion at the last two COCA meetings. So I guess everything is going to be just fine; go back to sleep now.
lol, In reality they will probably just ship 100 or so kids to chicago at the places they already have set up.
The AOA would rather debate the nomenclature of how an osteopath should be referred to than concentrate on anything else. Especially where you are going to do your clinicals...whatever.
I would blame the AOA more than AZCOM. They open a new school every year. You can expect them to take a break from that and just start doubling class sizes. As everyone else says, all about the $$$. I am ashamed to have the AOA supposedly representing me but not nearly as ashamed as I will be in a few years when these DO mills are cranking out subpar doctors. DO discrimination will be stronger than ever and unfortuanately it will probably be well earned by that point.
I wouldn' worry about the subpar doctors bit. Admissions stats for DO schools may change, but COMLEX and USMLE will not get any easier. If the future students will be really be subpar, they'll get crap board scores and probably find themselves out of a job.
I was looking into MD/DO schools as a freshman and was definitely surprised how new DO schools and branch campuses were opening up so quickly. Like most people said, I don't think it is such a great thing. I would like to see more state supported schools opening with hospital affiliations over private institutions with sky-high tuition.
Anywho, I'm interesting in the pod program at AZPOD but a bit turned off with the huge class size increase at AZCOM (we take classes together for the first 2 years minus OMM and a few DO oriented classes). Soon they will probably increase the pod class size as well.
Anywho, I'm interesting in the pod program at AZPOD but a bit turned off with the huge class size increase at AZCOM (we take classes together for the first 2 years minus OMM and a few DO oriented classes). Soon they will probably increase the pod class size as well.
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True, to a point, but there is more to practicing medicine than passing an exam. We all know inferior doctors who do well on tests/boards. Clinical training of high quality is essential. Fortunately, one of the most important components of education is the residency and the ACGME is extraordinarily rigorous in its accreditation and regulation process. Of course, as the market gets flooded with new grads, the ACGME spaces will dry up and more and more DO grads will have to train in weaker programs. All it will take for the whole house of cards to fall down is one or two high profile patient deaths/incidents. One patient, Libby Zion, was enough to greatly change the ACGME (arguably, to questionable benefit). Who will be the osteopathic Libby Zion?
Depends on which off shore school you are referring to. "Everyone knows Caribbean schools are money/diploma mills" is to paint with an extremely large brush. I would be hard pressed to put SCU, Ross or AUC in this category, although it has the "ring of truth" for all the rest. Although these 3 schools are proprietary, a graduate who has completed residency and holds board certification is many more times than not going to be quite competent. Just as much as any D.O. Over the years (since I graduated as a D.O.) I have seen this to be the case. Sweeping generalizations such as this intellectually hail from the same mindset that produces statements such as "all D.O. schools are inferior". I am sure that after further reflection on this you will see some validity here.
uhm..yea i would put SGU (not SCU) and Ross into that category. How else can you explain having 450-500 students per semester, 3 times a year? AUC has so far guarded against increasing class sizes, but they are starting to do so now 10 at a time, which is more respectable. They know half are not going to make it through so they just increase their odds. So yes, I would consider 'most' Caribbean schools as diploma mills.
Than my definition of "diploma mill"is at odds with your own. One could almost be misled by your use of the term to connotate a school turning out the inept and incompetent in exchange for money. However, don't forget that the attrition rate at Ross for example is well over 50% with many if not most not making it out of the first 2 years. Seems to me a truly efficient "money/diploma mill" would tolerate little attrition. Thus assuring continued money from all reguardless of whether they have a reasonable chance to do well enough on the boards to enter an accrediated residency in the U.S.
If you are using that phrase "money/diploma mill" to infer that these 3 schools turn out (graduate) people hopelessly unprepared to complete their boards and obtain a satisfactory residency,and armed only with an unearned M.D. degree that had been acquired stricly by an exchange of money, and with no other suitable qualifications required, than I know that to be foolish and untrue.
wow,
but maybe CCOM being so large, they have good experience in how to deal with large class sizes.
but maybe CCOM being so large, they have good experience in how to deal with large class sizes.
Opening up more schools is not the answer.
We (those in charge) should focus on the osteopathic schools already out there. Most of them well established and able to provide high quality education.
We do produce a lot of great physicians. Plus its great being the "unknown" doctor. I dig it. And when you see another D.O. at a big allo institution you have an instant connection with that person.
We (those in charge) should focus on the osteopathic schools already out there. Most of them well established and able to provide high quality education.
We do produce a lot of great physicians. Plus its great being the "unknown" doctor. I dig it. And when you see another D.O. at a big allo institution you have an instant connection with that person.
I guess our definitions do differ, however, any school that is willing to let their class sizes increase that far is in it for the money. Instead of just tripling the class size, why don't they concentrate harder on creating stronger physicians?
