Sam Houston medical school clears hurdle
Osteopathic college gets pre-accreditation, plans to start recruiting students for 2020
Sam Houston State University has cleared one of the necessary hurdles for its proposed osteopathic medical college in Conroe.
The college received pre-accreditation status from the Commission on Osteopathic College Accreditation after the commission’s August board meeting. Now, the college can start recruiting for its first class of medical students, set to start in August 2020.
The college’s actual facility, off Interstate 45 in Conroe’s Grand Central Park community, is still being built. The 108,000 square foot facility situated on 7.3 acres is expected to be mostly complete by the end of this year, university officials said..
The Conroe site was chosen because there was no land available at the university’s main campus in Huntsville, officials said last year. There are only two other osteopathic medical schools in Texas: The University of the Incarnate Word School of Osteopathic Medicine in San Antonio, and the Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine at the University of North Texas in Fort Worth.
Most medical schools in the United States teach traditional medicine, known as allopathic medicine, for which doctors receive their MDs. Osteopathic doctors receive the same education but they have a more holistic approach to practicing medicine, taking into account lifestyle and environmental factors into patient well being.
According to the American Osteopathic Association, DOs also take additional training in osteopathic manipulative treatment, which is when a DO uses their hands to “diagnose illness and injury and encourage your body’s natural tendency toward selfhealing.”
DOs also receive specific training in the musculoskeletal system and use manipulative treatment, which entails moving a patient’s muscles and joints “using techniques that include stretching, gentle pressure and resistance,” according to the Osteopathic Association.
The University of Houston, which hopes to open the city’s first new medical school in nearly 50 years, is currently under review by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education, the body that accredits traditional medical schools. The committee recently informed UH it will make its site visit in November.
Sam Houston State University has already hired four deans and more than 26 staff and faculty members for the college. Residency programs have already been established in rural East Texas, where health care facilities and options are harder to access.
“Our medical education model is built to serve rural Texans. The process has been challenging, as it should be, and today’s affirmation from the COCA shows that Sam Houston State not only has the passion, but has an exceptional plan backed by exceptional people,” Sam Houston President Dana Hoyt in a release.
UH has also hired a dean, and hopes to admit its first class next year. The UH medical school will train physicians to serve in urban and underserved areas of Houston and the state.
Sam Houston’s medical school has already confirmed 22 affiliation agreements with hospitals and clinics across eastern Texas. At SHSU’s osteopathic school, students will spend their first two years training at the medical school before completing rotations at the affiliated facilities.
The university was granted initial accreditation status in December 2018 when it was granted “candidate status.” The school won’t be fully accredited until the first class of students has graduated, which is expected in 2024.