The Rio Grande Valley has long been at a disadvantage regarding medical care, both in the volume of care available and its degree of advancement. To increase medical accessibility, the University of Texas at Rio Grande Valley School of Medicine was founded in 2015, training doctors, providing care, and conducting research to fulfill the region’s medical needs.
A primary goal of the School of Medicine is to foster the number of practitioners in a region otherwise lacking in medical professionals, increasing available healthcare.
“Texas has a shortage of physicians. Specifically, the Rio Grande Valley has a significant shortage of every specialist and every physician type,” said Dr. Micheal Hocker, Dean of the School of Medicine, in an interview.
The implications of medical undermanning are severe for individuals whose conditions cannot be treated locally, causing people to seek care outside of South Texas, which is not always an option for some given personal circumstances.
“We see a lot of folks who come into our practice that have never seen a physician that may have advanced cancers, advanced diabetes, advanced Alzheimer’s, or other diseases. If you’re underserved and don’t have opportunities, your diseases are more advanced. They go undiagnosed and oftentimes are fatal,” said Dr. Hocker.
The school also provides prospective doctors with a full medical education, with four years of schooling and available residency programs. Before its founding, there was no prior pathway to becoming a practitioner within the local region. Students had to leave the area and attend distant medical schools, often not returning to the Rio Grande Valley, further driving the scarcity of physicians. Now, local students may remain home throughout the course of their education.
“40 to 50 percent of our students are from the Rio Grande Valley. We anticipate that a good number of those will be returning to serve our community,” said Dr. Leonel Vela, Senior Associate Dean at the School of Medicine.
Education at the school is also financially accessible. It has a low cost of attendance, allowing more people the opportunity to become doctors.
“Our medical school is one of the most affordable medical schools in the country, and certainly here in the state of Texas. Our students, when they leave medical school here, have some of the lowest debt, literally some of the lowest debt than any other medical school in the country,” said Dr. Vela.
Another measure of the school in revolutionizing the health of South Texas is its research tailored to the region’s most afflicting of ailments.
“The medical school is really focused on developing areas of research to address major causes of morbidity and mortality here in the Valley,” said Dr. Vela.
“We have a group of neuroscientists and behavioral scientists looking at Alzheimer’s, which is very prevalent in the Rio Grande Valley. We also have a group focusing on diabetes, obesity, and genetics and understanding why people are developing diseases,” said Dr. Hocker.
The School of Medicine also provides clinical care to patients, bringing an academic scope of treatment to the region. Contemporary, innovative approaches to treatment are applied, and there is a greater emphasis on learning and the cultivation of medicinal knowledge from the care provided.
“We bring a different kind of quality to the Rio Grande Valley and really are recruiting, you know, top-notch physicians who practice state-of-the-art medicine,” said Hocker.
Amongst the school’s innovations is its upcoming Cancer and Surgery Center. A $145 million project funded by the University of Texas System to provide advanced, high-quality cancer care to the region. It will be staffed by UTRGV professors and physicians, providing academic care to patients going above and beyond standard cancer care.
“We provide care for cancer patients while also being responsible for the development of new cancer treatments and conducting research into the various cancers prevalent in our community. In addition to our clinical and research missions, we aim to educate the physicians we train—whether they are medical students or residents—so that when they enter the community, they are equipped to provide quality care to patients,” said Dr. Everardo Cobos, who leads the Medicine and Oncology Department at the School of Medicine.
