New Medical School Updates 3.13.21

MONTANA

Montana is one of four states without a dedicated medical school. Idaho used to be the fifth state without a medical school until they welcomed their first class into the Idaho College of Osteopathic Medicine (ICOM) in 2018.

Rocky Vista will be opening a campus for an Osteopathic Medicine program in Billings, Montana, which will be named the Montana College of Osteopathic Medicine. The plans are to be in full operation by 2026. In the proposal plans, the medical school would open in 2023, with 80 students taking classes, and the number of students would then grow to more than 100 the next year. Rocky Vista has been in talks with Billings Clinic, St. Vincent Healthcare, and RiverStone Health, all based in Billings, about possible partnerships.

Touro has also been considering a campus in Montana.

Rocky Vista University was established in 2006 as the nation’s first private, for-profit health sciences university to offer a professional medical degree since 1910, according to the school's website. The college would be Montana's only four-year undergraduate medical school. Rocky Vista operates two other schools in Colorado and Southern Utah. This reopens the conversation of for-profit vs. not-for-profit medical schools.

The LCME, the accrediting body for MD schools had previously not provided accreditation unless a school was not for profit, however, this is no longer true since 2013. The accrediting body for osteopathic schools the Commission on Osteopathic College Accreditation (COCA)has always allowed a for-profit model. See image below for other for profit medical schools.

ARKANSAS:

There is a new allopathic (MD) private nonprofit medical school, “The Whole Health School of Medicine and Health Sciences” planned for Arkansas with a focus on integrative health, funded by Walmart heir Alice Walton. The plan is to break ground in 2022 and to begin classes in the fall of 2024.

The Whole Health Institute was founded in 2020 to “to focus on radically redesigning the systems that impact our health and well-being with the ultimate goal of making the Whole Health model affordable and accessible to all. This, together with a grass roots, community based movement will create a radical shift in connectivity, compassion, and collective humanity.”

The curriculum will include certificates that may include functional nutrition, mental health, social work, and health coaching, and faculty development in "Whole Health approaches."

"The Whole Health School of Medicine will help medical students rise to the health challenges of the 21st century through a reimagination of American medical education that incorporates mental, emotional, physical and spiritual health, the elements of Whole Health, to help people live healthier and happier lives," Alice Walton said in a statement.