19
COM Outlook . Winter 2014
nation. The preponderance of this growth
has been in the opening of new colleges
of osteopathic medicine. There are cur-
rently 30 colleges of osteopathic medi-
cine, offering instruction at 40 locations
in 28 states. As a result, the osteopathic
profession will be graduating nearly
5,000 fourth-year medical students annu-
ally within the next two or three years.
All of these graduates will need to
enter minimally a first postgraduate year
of training to achieve licensure in one
of the 50 states. The vast majority will
continue on in training for an additional
two to seven years to realize a board cer-
tification in a specialty or subspecialty of
medicine. Currently, the osteopathic pro-
fession only retains approximately 2,600
first postgraduate year training positions
nationally. The profession as a whole
acutely needs to increase osteopathic
graduate medical education positions
nationally so as to address the training
needs of its growing number of students.
Again, NSU’s ability to open an academ-
ic medical center on its own campus will
allow NSU-COM to work with hospital
administration to grow new OGME posi-
tions for its medical school graduates.
Compounding the OGME issue is
the fact that the ACGME is projected to
change the common program rules that
guide the administration of ACGME-ac-
credited programs nationally. Currently,
graduates of an accredited osteopathic
internship and/or residency program
can pursue subspecialty training within
ACGME-accredited programs. Projected
changes to the common program rules
in July 2015 will bar osteopathically
trained physicians from being able to
enter these allopathically accredited
subspecialty programs. As a result, the
osteopathic profession must acutely
address the need to grow subspecialty
training programs for its internship and
residency program graduates. NSU’s
ability to open an academic medical
center on its own campus will allow the
COM to work with hospital administra-
tion to acutely grow new osteopathically
accredited subspecialty positions for
its affiliated internship and residency
program graduates.
The joint hospital venture between
NSU and HCA will also serve the
people of Broward County as a re-
source and center of medical excellence.
Patients in the local community as well
as throughout Broward County will be
able to seek medical care by both top
specialists as well as primary care physi-
cians who will provide cutting-edge
and comprehensive care to the patients
they serve. The care rendered at the new
facility will encompass an interdisciplin-
ary team approach that will be unique
within Broward County. Teams of
physicians, physician assistants, nurses,
pharmacists, optometrists, and den-
tists will jointly care for patients in this
cutting-edge model.
The hospital will be situated jux-
taposed to NSU and will serve as a
research center where new treatment
modalities can be developed and tested
in a real-time laboratory environment.
This, of course, will be the only such
relationship of this kind that exists in
Broward County. Again, this will serve
the people of Broward County, as they
will have access to unique treatment
methods that are not to be found any-
where else in the local community.
Lastly, this new facility will serve as
a tremendous resource for the training
of the future health care professionals
of Broward County. Physicians, physi-
cian assistants, pharmacists, dentists,
and the like from Nova Southeastern
University will all have the opportunity
to train in the new and progressive
medical center.
The planned building of an HCA-
supported academic medical center on
NSU’s main campus will address the
urgent clinical experiential needs of both
NSU-COM’s undergraduate and gradu-
ate trainees. The citizens of Broward
County will realize the fruits of having
a robust academic medical center within
their midst due to the access to excep-
tional clinicians, cutting-edge research,
and interdisciplinary care the medical
center will afford them.
“The joint hospital venture between NSU and HCA will serve the people of Broward County as a
resource and center of medical excellence. Patients in the local community as well as throughout
Broward County will be able to seek medical care by both top specialists as well as primary care
physicians who will provide cutting-edge and comprehensive care to the patients they serve.”
