162 new students will begin classes when the Burrell College of Osteopathic Medicine opens on Monday, August 8th.
Dr. George Mychaskiw, Founding Dean and Chief Academic Officer of the Burrell College of Osteopathic Medicine, says the border region was the perfect place to start a medical school because of the needs.
“The border region is the most underserved part of the country,” Mychaskiw said. “And the people here had disease processes and they had shortages of physicians that were similar to developing companies around the world. So, I conceived of this idea for what a medical school would look like on the border because a medical school is a great way to improve a region’s health care.”
Mychaskiw says the new school will almost immediately change the medical landscape of the Las Cruces region.
“It changes the nature and the character of the local hospitals, clinics and physician populations” Mychaskiw said. “Because you have these young people, who are learning, who are energetic and who are bringing ideas to a community, and they are members of the community. It’s our goal for many of our students to stay permanently and sustainably in the border regions.”
Mychaskiw says the medical school will help the doctor shortage in the region by bringing in faculty that will practice in the region, and providing more residencies. To date, 108 new residencies have been approved in the Las Cruces Metro area, and he expects that number to grow.
“Psychiatry for instance,” Mychaskiw said. “By coming here, we’ve hired a chair of psychiatry. We’ve brought in a whole faculty to teach clinical psychiatry, and next year there will be a psychiatry residency in Las Cruces, and previously if you needed a psychiatrist in Las Cruces sometimes it was on the telephone, sometimes there was one, sometimes there wasn’t one it was hard to tell. So, the medical school by it’s teaching mission has to bring in a lot of people, has to hire a lot of people and that just increases the workforce in the region immediately.”
Mychaskiw says they have already increased the number of New Mexicans attending Osteopathic Medical schools.
“Last year in the whole country,” Mychaskiw said. “There were 8 residents from New Mexico training at these various medical schools. This year we have 18 residents from New Mexico, citizens of New Mexico starting here at BCOM, so, what happened. Obviously we increased the interest in Osteopathic medicine, did we take all those 8 from other schools and bring them here. I think that’s unlikely, I think we lifted all the boats.”
Debbi Moore, President and CEO of the Greater Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce says by increasing the quality of care in the region, more businesses will want to locate here.
“I can tell you it is a problem everywhere,” Moore said. “A concern that when people move in, they want to be sure that you have good quality education, good quality medical facilities. Las Cruces can be a healthcare destination, and this is just another piece of that pie, as we continue to grow that health care destination piece.”
Dr. Mychaskiw says going forward they expect the school to have a sustained economic impact of about $120 million dollars a year.
“These students are all here,” Mychaskiw said. “They have families, their renting apartments, their spending money, and we hope they stay as physicians. Every physician that stays in the region has an economic impact of $2 million and contributes 9 new jobs to the region. So for a town and a region of this size it’s going to be a transformative change if you look just at economic impact.”
Mychaskiw says when the first class graduates in 2020, they will increase the number of new physicians graduating in New Mexico by over 200%.
The Burrell College of Osteopathic Medicine will have open houses for the community to visit the school this fall.
