UAB to Open New Med School Branch
UAB Opens Medical School Branch in Montgomery
The University of Alabama at Birmingham is opening a branch of the medical school in Montgomery. UAB officials announced the plan yesterday. The new medical school branch will be located on the campus of Baptist Medical Center South. Ten third-year medical students will begin taking classes in Montgomery in May 2014; in 2015 the incoming class size will expand to 20. This is the third regional campus for the School of Medicine — the others are in Huntsville and Tuscaloosa.
The UAB School of Medicine’s regional campuses were created in large part to meet the need for more primary care physicians in Alabama.
“There is a dearth of primary care physicians in the River Region of Central Alabama, and the average age of doctors is over 50,” says Wick Many, M.D., former director of the Montgomery Internal Medicine Residency Program and the newly appointed regional dean of the Montgomery branch campus.
Most states in the country are dealing with a shortage of physicians. In 2010, Alabama had 3,230 primary care physicians, for a rate of 68.3 per 100,000 people, ranking the state 45th in the country, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. The shortage is even worse in rural areas. In order to meet the needs of a growing and aging population, the AAMC estimates the country will need 45,000 more primary care physicians and 46,000 more surgeons and specialists by 2020.
At UAB’s regional campuses in Huntsville and Tuscaloosa, 52 percent of graduates enter primary care. At the main campus in Birmingham, the majority of graduates — 74 percent — choose non-primary care specialties.
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