UH explores possibility of medical school

The Chronicle reports today that the University of Houston is taking the first steps toward starting a medical school, a move that would help address physician shortages in Texas and across the country — but could be an uphill struggle politically.

The proposal for a UH medical school, drawn up by Kentucky medical school planners DJW Associates, calls for a starting class of 30 students with 15 basic sciences faculty members and six full-time clinical faculty, numbers similar to those at UT-Houston and Texas A&M's medical programs when they started in the 1970s. No new construction would be done initially; the startup cost would be $7.15 million, with a $9.5 million annual operating budget. The school would operate in partnership with The Methodist Hospital and Cornell University, a combination that UH President Jay Gogue said would be very worthwhile: "When you get a chance to work with Cornell, one of the nation's best medical schools, you have to follow through," Gogue told the Chronicle. "If our talks are productive, it could be a win for students, the Houston region, the state and UH's national research agenda."

Plans for the medical school, as preliminary as they are, have been kept under wraps by the university: The Chronicle only found out about DJW's report through a Freedom of Information request which UH initially sought to appeal. The secrecy may be due in part to the political opposition UH is almost sure to face: The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board said in 2002 that El Paso or the Rio Grande Valley are the preferred sites for any new medical school in Texas, The University of Texas at Austin is looking at founding a medical school, and state Rep. Garnet Coleman is interested in getting one started at Prairie View A&M. "It would be my preference that Prairie View gets a medical school before UH or UT," Coleman — who, incidentally, represents UH — told the Chronicle. (Houston already has two medical schools, UT-Houston and Baylor College of Medicine, with UTMB and the A&M Health Science Center nearby.)

Gogue said he expects a recommendation from UH Provost Donald Foss within the next six months, which the UH Board of Regents would discuss and send to the Coordinating Board. A proposal wouldn't go before the Legislature until at least 2009, Gogue said. "We would be remiss if we didn't explore the possibility," he said. "When you're sitting next to the world's largest medical center, in a state that's 41st out of 50th in physicians per capita, it would be almost unconscionable not to do due diligence."