Lewisburg osteopathic school puts doctors in rural areas
LEWISBURG - Michael Brackman wanted to be a trauma surgeon. Now he's not so sure. Chellie Abe wanted to be an obstetrician-gynecologist. Now she's undecided, too.
Students practice on robots that talk, breathe and bleed.
Chellie Abe wanted to be an obstetrician-gynecologist. Now she's undecided, too.
Brackman and Abe both want to become doctors, but after enrolling at the West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine in Lewisburg, the future physicians have started to question what type of doctors they want to be.
They realize there's more to medicine than a big paycheck. They realize they can make as much of a difference in the lives of patients in a small town as in a large city.
"It's not just about working and leaving, it's about being part of a community," said Brackman, a second-year student at the osteopathic school. "A lot of us will carry that on into our practice."
A recent study showed that 42 percent of West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine students are practicing in rural areas in the United States.
No medical school - either osteopathic or traditional - has a higher percentage of physician graduates working in rural communities, according to the study by Dr. Robert Bowman, a professor at a medical school in Arizona.
What's more, the bulk of those graduates - 85 percent - are family doctors, working in primary care practices.
About one of every three osteopathic school graduates stays in West Virginia to practice. Osteopaths are in 45 of the state's 55 counties.
The osteopathic school opened in 1972. It started as a private school on a campus of the former Greenbrier Military prep school. Two years later, it became a state-funded institution.
The osteopathic branch of medicine was founded in 1874 by Dr. A.T. Still, a frontiersman who believed that a physician's primary role was to facilitate the body's inherent ability to heal itself.
Osteopathic doctors use the same approaches as medical doctors. They prescribe drugs. They refer patients for surgery, or do the operations themselves if they have a surgeon's license. However, osteopathic doctors also perform hands-on manipulative techniques, using manual force to diagnose and treat patients.
Students start to use their hands for healing within the first weeks of classes - on each other.
"It gets real personal real fast," said Abe, a second-year student from Morgantown who formerly worked as a nurse.
Students and faculty stress that osteopathic treatment is "mainstream," not alternative medicine, and that osteopathic doctors work cooperatively with traditional medical doctors.
"We emphasize you're dealing with a person who has a mind, body and spirit," said Jim Nemitz, associate dean of preclinical education at the Lewisburg school. "It's holistic."
Brackman grew up in White Sulphur Springs, a 20-minute drive from Lewisburg.
Most of the doctors he visited as a boy were osteopaths. His family moved for four years to Charlottesville, Va., and right then he figured out the difference between an osteopath and traditional allopathic doctor.
"They didn't put their hands on you," Brackman recalled. "In Charlottesville, they asked you two or three questions, and you'd be gone."
Brackman and Abe wanted to attend medical school in West Virginia, and they both liked the historical and rural setting of the medical school's campus in Lewisburg.
LEWISBURG - Michael Brackman wanted to be a trauma surgeon. Now he's not so sure.
Chellie Abe wanted to be an obstetrician-gynecologist. Now she's undecided, too.
Brackman and Abe both want to become doctors, but after enrolling at the West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine in Lewisburg, the future physicians have started to question what type of doctors they want to be.
They realize there's more to medicine than a big paycheck. They realize they can make as much of a difference in the lives of patients in a small town as in a large city.
"It's not just about working and leaving, it's about being part of a community," said Brackman, a second-year student at the osteopathic school. "A lot of us will carry that on into our practice."
A recent study showed that 42 percent of West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine students are practicing in rural areas in the United States.
No medical school - either osteopathic or traditional - has a higher percentage of physician graduates working in rural communities, according to the study by Dr. Robert Bowman, a professor at a medical school in Arizona.
What's more, the bulk of those graduates - 85 percent - are family doctors, working in primary care practices.
About one of every three osteopathic school graduates stays in West Virginia to practice. Osteopaths are in 45 of the state's 55 counties.
The osteopathic school opened in 1972. It started as a private school on a campus of the former Greenbrier Military prep school. Two years later, it became a state-funded institution.
The osteopathic branch of medicine was founded in 1874 by Dr. A.T. Still, a frontiersman who believed that a physician's primary role was to facilitate the body's inherent ability to heal itself.
Osteopathic doctors use the same approaches as medical doctors. They prescribe drugs. They refer patients for surgery, or do the operations themselves if they have a surgeon's license. However, osteopathic doctors also perform hands-on manipulative techniques, using manual force to diagnose and treat patients.
Students start to use their hands for healing within the first weeks of classes - on each other.
"It gets real personal real fast," said Abe, a second-year student from Morgantown who formerly worked as a nurse.
Students and faculty stress that osteopathic treatment is "mainstream," not alternative medicine, and that osteopathic doctors work cooperatively with traditional medical doctors.
"We emphasize you're dealing with a person who has a mind, body and spirit," said Jim Nemitz, associate dean of preclinical education at the Lewisburg school. "It's holistic."
Brackman grew up in White Sulphur Springs, a 20-minute drive from Lewisburg.
Most of the doctors he visited as a boy were osteopaths. His family moved for four years to Charlottesville, Va., and right then he figured out the difference between an osteopath and traditional allopathic doctor.
"They didn't put their hands on you," Brackman recalled. "In Charlottesville, they asked you two or three questions, and you'd be gone."
Brackman and Abe wanted to attend medical school in West Virginia, and they both liked the historical and rural setting of the medical school's campus in Lewisburg.
Most medical schools - osteopathic and traditional - are housed on large college campuses where students train at university-owned hospitals. The West Virginia osteopathic school bills itself as "freestanding."
"If we're not the most rural medical school in the country or the world, then we're one of the most rural," Nemitz said. "You typically don't find medical schools in a town of 3,000 people."
The school pumps an estimated $85 million into the economy of Lewisburg and surrounding Greenbrier County, according to school spokesman Jeff Cobb.
The osteopathic school has an operating budget of about $35 million a year and 195 full-time workers - administrators, faculty and staff. That makes it one of the largest employers in the county. An additional 65 people work at the Robert C. Byrd medical clinic next to the school.
"The economic impact is huge," Nemitz said. "It's all helpful in enhancing the town and region."
The school has spent more than $38 million on construction and renovation projects while growing from one building - the old brick-faced military academy - to 12 facilities on the 55-acre campus. The newest facilities include a technology center, alumni center and anatomy lab.
In March, the school broke ground on a new $9.3 million "Center for Clinical Evaluation" building.
The 19,000-square-foot facility will house a clinic, exam rooms and a six-unit robot laboratory where students practice life-saving skills on mannequins that breathe, cry and bleed like real patients.
The project, expected to be completed by May 2009, will include more than 100 parking spaces. The school also plans to expand the student recreation center nearby.
The growth has prompted some pain - in the form of opposition from homeowners in the historic neighborhood that borders the campus. The school has purchased several properties over the years, and residents have complained that they've been kept in the dark about future expansion plans.
Cobb said the school's master plan calls for buying additional property surrounding the campus "when it becomes available," but provided no specifics.
He said the school accepts 200 students per class - out of 2,700 applicants a year - and has no immediate plans to increase class sizes.
The school doesn't shy away from promotion, particularly when it comes to its annual ranking in U.S. News & World Report's "Guide to Graduate Schools." The magazine named the osteopathic school one of the nation's top 10 schools for rural medicine in four out of the past six years. The school also was ranked in the top 50 for its primary care and family medicine programs 10 years in a row.
The U.S. News ranking dominates the school's Web site, and the admissions office uses the recognition to recruit students.
About 40 percent of enrolled students come from West Virginia, the rest from other states, including rural ones such as Alaska and North Dakota.
For those unfamiliar with rural communities, the osteopathic school makes sure they get a taste of rural life before they leave, assigning them to rotations at hospitals and clinics in small towns across the state.
Medical students also are expected to volunteer. In Greenbrier County, they visit schools and talk about the dangers of drug overdoses. They raise money for the local volunteer ambulance service. One student is helping coach the middle school soccer team.
"We recognize physicians as potential community leaders," Nemitz said. "A rural doctor should be a community leader, and often is."
Nemitz expects Brackman and Abe to become leaders - and successful physicians - after graduation.
"Our founders had a vision that there was a need for more rural doctors, and how are we going to do it," he said. "That vision produced results. Our graduates have been leaders in providing primary care in rural towns."
To contact staff writer Eric Eyre, use e-mail or call 348-4869.
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