“This plan has been scrutinized at every level, and I am delighted that it has passed scrutiny with true experts, the LCME,” said USC President Harris Pastides in a press release. “Expanding medical education in Greenville is the right thing to do because it will increase the supply of physicians and advance efforts to retain physicians in the Upstate and the state at large.”
The USC School of Medicine, which admitted its first class in 1977 in Columbia, expanded to included upper level training at the Greenville Hospital System in 1991.
The expansion will increase the number of medical school graduates in the state tremendously. This year, the USC School of Medicine has 96 first-year students, while the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston has 170 first-year students. If the Greenville class-size projections play out as expected, USC’s two campuses will have 200 or more students in four years.
As the expansion was discussed in recent years, two concerns earned most of the attention – cost to taxpayers and post-medical school training. Proponents pledged no tax dollars would be necessary, with the cost covered by pledges from the Greenville Hospital System and student tuition.
“We have an airtight agreement with GHS that this program will not rely on any state funds,” Pastides said. “To turn down a proposal to expand medical school education without state funds would not have been a wise decision for the people of our state.”
But graduating from medical school is just the first step for future physicians. They must serve residencies to hone their craft. Most residencies are served at major teaching hospitals – in South Carolina at MUSC, Palmetto Health and the Greenville Hospital System. Residency programs are expensive, and teaching hospitals were among the hardest hit by recent state Medicaid cuts.
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