HUNTSVILLE, Texas — With recent shortages in primary care physicians all over Texas, Sam Houston State University is looking to provide a solution to the issue.
Thomas Mohr, DO, SHSU-COM dean spoke with KAGS about what the program was meant to accomplish.
“Our mission is to help to provide and train primary care physicians for rural areas and community based training and medical school goes for four years but after that you need to do a residency program and that’s when you do three or more years in the specialty that you’re gonna be involved in,” said Mohr.
The university and Huntsville Memorial Hospital have created this residency program to provide family medicine physicians that will cater to the communities in need.
“We know that the state of Texas has a really severe shortage of primary care physicians, especially in the rural and underserved areas of East Texas,” explained Mohr.
Recent analysis of primary care shortages in Texas shows that as of July 2021, 249 of Texas’ 254 counties are in need of physicians.
“Starting this summer we will accept our first cohort of four residents and each year we will accept more and more until we max out at 12," said Mohr. "These are going to be medical graduates who will live, work and play in that area in Huntsville working with the good folks there and we’re working also with the rural population surrounding Huntsville and our hope is that we’ll get some of those folks to stay there when they're done but certainly they’ll be able to improve access to healthcare in that community.”