A cross-state partnership will produce Pennsylvania’s second new medical college in the last five years.
The Philadelphia-based Temple University School of Medicine (TUSM) and Pittsburgh’s West Penn Allegheny Health System (WPAHS) announced a collaboration to establish a four-year medical school campus on Pittsburgh’s North Side, according to a news release issued Friday morning.
WPAHS has served as a clinical campus of TUSM for third- and fourth-year medical students. The expanded partnership will allow WPAHS to provide all four years of undergrad medical education to TUSM students, and is expected to address a critical shortage of physicians in Western PA.
“Temple University School of Medicine has been an excellent partner of our system for more than a decadde,” says WPAHS President and CEO Christopher T. Olivia, “and the xpansion of our relationship into a four-year medical school program will greatly advance our collective ability to not only educate more physicians but also meet the future healthcare needs of patients and our communities through enhanced medical research opportunities.
The Commonwealth Medical College, based in Scranton, welcomd its first class of students in August, 2009, becoming the seventh school in PA to confer the doctor of medicine degree.
Thirty students will be accepted in the first class of the TUSM-WPAHS program, scheduled to begin in 2013 near Allegheny General Hospital. WPAHS plans on renovating its existing facility there to accommodate the school, investing in advanced simulation training technology and state-of-the-art classrooms and laboratories with videoconferencing capabilities.
Joe Petrucci is managing editor of Keystone Edge. Send feedback here.