But the LCME was not happy with that. So we started to bring on additional
faculty in the various areas, and we created a curriculum that worked really well
for the students in those early years. It certainly helped prepare them for the
licensing exam, which was a big hurdle that we knew they would all face after
the second year.
We also continued that early clinical education for students and preceptorships
in the Clinical Learning Center, helping get them prepared for that third
year when they would be going out to our clinical faculty in the community.
One of the promises we made to physician faculty members as we were
recruiting them was that, in those first two years, we were going to make sure
that students got the skills they needed to be able to walk into their office the
first day on the clerkship and be comfortable interacting with patients, taking
history from patients, performing physicals, because they would’ve been doing
it all through the first two years. I have to say that I think, across the board, they
were really impressed, and pleasantly surprised, that our students really did arrive
at the regional campuses ready to go.
Interestingly enough, it was a piece of our curriculum that the LCME
attacked the hardest – not believing that practicing physicians in the community
who weren’t in an academic health center could actually teach students what they
needed to know. So, we were constantly battling with the LCME: that we were
providing appropriate faculty development, that they were perfectly positioned
to be the teachers for our students in the clinical years.
So getting that first class through that process and seeing the success that we
had with the students, getting all of them matched into residencies, was a huge
checkmark. I think that we all were able to breathe a sigh of relief when that happened.
Then it was making sure that the next class after them was also successful.
[Myra Hurt: What criticisms of the LCME did you find the hardest to take?]
First, them basically telling us that what we were doing couldn’t work. The
message we were getting was: “If you’re going to get a medical school, it’s going
to look like the rest of them, or we’re going to make it really difficult for you to
get through accreditation.” Because many of the things that they were citing us
for early on were things that we never intended to include.
We were specifically establishing something that was different but that would
clearly prepare students to be good doctors. They kept hammering us for not
having residents teaching our students, for instance. They just couldn’t wrap their
brains around the fact that “we’re going to have these practicing physicians in the
community without the presence of residency teams teaching our students.”
[Myra Hurt: My husband, a heart surgeon, asked a vascular surgeon at a
meeting with their community faculty: “Who do you think is better trained
to teach a medical student, a resident or a practicing physician?” And the
vascular surgeon said, “A practicing physician, of course.” And, of course, the
LCME should know that better than anyone. They all had practiced, surely.
They must remember how little they knew when they were training medical
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