Austin - Community Impact Newspaper

Austin medical school sidelined by Hurricane Ike
By Patrick Brendel
The recession and Hurricane
Ike forestalled efforts to bring a
medical school to Austin during
the Texas Legislative Session.
Poor economic conditions made
for a state budget with little room
for major new projects, especially
in light of the hundreds of millions
of dollars needed to rebuild
Galveston, its medical school and
other areas also hit by Ike.
Realizing the impracticality
of making a medical school
proposal at this time, state legislators
did not file a single bill
during the session related to an
Austin medical school.
The State Legislature did,
however, pass legislation committing
to build a medical school
in Harlingen. Currently, the only
medical school on the Texas-
Mexico border is the new Texas
Tech University Health Sciences
Center in El Paso.
“That’s been determined to be
a high-need area. There are those
that essentially want to get it on
record that, if there’s going to be
a medical school, it needs to go in
an area where we really need to
bring in larger numbers of physicians,”
said state Rep. Donna
Howard, D-Austin. “But that
doesn’t preclude having something
happen in Austin as well.”
Rio Grande Valley legislators
were unable to procure funding
for their future medical
school. Instead, the bill allows
University of Texas regents to
take steps toward creating the
medical school by the year 2015.
The price tag on the Harlingen
medical school is expected to be
more than $100 million. (State
lawmakers appropriated $300
million toward rebuilding the
Ike-damaged University of Texas
Medical Branch-Galveston.)
Looking toward the future,
Austin still possesses qualities
that are conducive to establishing
a medical school: its central
location, UT’s flagship campus, a
prominent medical community
and cooperative business leaders.
One encouraging sign is the announcement
that UT Southwestern
Medical School in Dallas plans
to take over the residency program
at Seton Family of Hospitals. That
means an increase
in the number of
El Paso
residents trained.
Howard said the
existence of the Texas
A&M Health Science Center
in Round Rock would not halt
the potential creation of a new
medical school in Austin. Texas
A&M-Round Rock is geared
toward training practitioners,
while a potential Austin medical
school would be research-based.
“They would be different types
of medical schools,” she said.
Texas medical school campuses
* Proposed
Amarillo
Lubbock
What are you doing this fall?
There’s still time to register for ACC’s fall semester.
Check the course schedule
online at austincc.edu.
Forth Worth
Round Rock
San Antonio
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College Station
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Odessa
10
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UT system
Texas A&M system
Texas Tech system
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35
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Dallas
Harlingen *
Baylor
UNT
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Corpus Christi
Houston
Galveston