Nova Southeastern University’s newest medical school graduates its first class
Nova Southeastern University’s newest medical school graduated its first class of doctors Friday just as physician shortages are gripping the country.
Eric Young, who received his diploma Friday, said he and his classmates will leave the NSU’s Dr. Kiran C. Patel College of Allopathic Medicine with academic knowledge and the real-life experience of studying medicine during a pandemic.
“We are a tight-knit group who will go on to bring diversity to the medical field,” said Young, 41, who lives in Miami Gardens.
The graduates will move on to residency programs across the country in varied specialties, with about 40% remaining in Florida.
“The pressure on us to create better doctors has never been as strong as it is now,” said Dr. Johannes Vieweg, dean and chief academic officer of the Dr. Kiran C. Patel College of Allopathic Medicine, the 148th accredited U.S. medical school.
Florida will be short almost 18,000 physicians by the year 2035, according to the Safety Net Hospital Alliance of Florida and the Florida Hospital Association, an advocacy group for more than 200 Florida hospitals. “With COVID and Florida’s aging population and more citizens coming into the state, we are approaching a crisis,” Vieweg said.
Vieweg said this group of inaugural graduates — chosen in 2018 from more than 6,000 applicants — represents “a special breed of doctors.”
“To join a new medical school that has not been
tested was a bold move on their part,” he said. “We were very attentive to them and mentored them and the outcome speaks for itself.”
NSU was a pioneer in the Southeast more than two decades ago with its College of Osteopathic Medicine, which has campuses in Clearwater and Davie. Osteopathic medicine is a more holistic approach to medicine. Allopathic medicine is considered more traditional and focuses on diagnosing disease. Vieweg said the College of Allopathic Medicine, which opened in 2018, has opportunities to get research grants and its students will study under physician educators at the HCA University Hospital adjacent to campus.
Young received a handshake and his robe on Friday and said he will go on to a three-year residency program in emergency medicine at the University of Chicago Medical Center. He says he chose emergency medicine after growing up in a Miami Gardens neighborhood where shootings and other mayhem were rampant and he regularly saw the need for emergency care.
“The emergency room is front and center of every hospital,” Young said. ”It’s my personality to get in there, jump in, and help people at their most vulnerable moment.”
Young, who previously owned a Miami tattoo parlor and worked at Jackson Memorial Hospital as a phlebotomist, said he plans to eventually return to South Florida to practice medicine.