College of Medicine

Though it’s the usual busy summer here at the College of Medicine, with the Class of 2021 hard at work in the anatomy lab and the Clinical Learning Center, there also are many new initiatives making headlines.

We’re busy preparing for the first class of 40 PA students who will arrive here Aug. 22 and start classes Aug. 28. Jim Zedaker and his team are working hard to begin a new tradition at FSU. The students will spend their first 15-month phase here at the main campus and then report to the regional campuses for a 12-month clinical phase in pursuit of a Master of Science in Physician Assistant Practice.

Our Interdisciplinary Medical Sciences program is a joint collaboration with six other FSU colleges and provides a new major for undergraduate students potentially interested in health careers. They will receive guidance and support as they attend seminars, complete their requirements and consider what track to pursue later on: Community Patient Care; Health Management, Policy & Information; or Pre-Health Professions. This highly popular major already has more students signing up for it than were projected for the first five years.

We continue to expand our graduate medical education offerings to provide more places for our alumni to match without having to leave Florida. Recently we helped recruit a program director for Sarasota Memorial Hospital to begin an emergency medicine residency program, alongside our recently established internal medicine program there. Next month we’ll announce a partnership with Winter Haven Hospital to sponsor a family medicine program there, and we’re planning a psychiatry residency with Tallahassee Memorial in the near future.

More impressive news: Our total research funding has accelerated to $64 million, compared with $46 million last year and just $9 million back in 2005. Many of our investigators were rewarded this year with new or renewal R01 grants from the National Institutes of Health, and we’re reaping the benefits of superb recruiting over the past 10 years. We are clearly making a major impact on total grants at FSU, and we trust that our newest faculty members to join us this summer will continue this record of success.

Meanwhile, our first-year medical students are about to take their final block exams and then receive their White Coats on Aug. 11. I greatly enjoy this annual rite of passage as they take the Student Oath and promise to uphold the values of the profession. On that same evening, we also will induct 13 fourth-year students into the Chapman Chapter of the Gold Humanism Honor Society. By doing so, we’ll remind our first-year students of the ideals they should aspire to in patient-centered and compassionate care.

Many thanks to all who participate in our teaching programs at the central campus and regional campuses. Here’s to a productive fall semester.

Sincerely,

J. Fogarty, M.D., Dean