Texas A&M, DeTar Healthcare to open family medicine residency program

South Texas is set to get another family medicine residency program soon. Texas A&M Health Science Center and DeTar Healthcare System have agreed to a partnership to open a new program in Victoria. As long as the program gains approval from the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, it should accept its first six residents in 2015.

DeTar is one of nine hospitals to win a $150,000 planning grant from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board to help plan the new program. TAFP championed the creation of the grants by the 83rd Texas Legislature as part of a package of initiatives designed to expand residency training across the state and to strengthen the primary care infrastructure.

According to a statement by the Texas Hospital Association, the new planning grants are “much needed to address the state’s serious physician shortage that creates access difficulties for residents across the state. Texas has the fastest growing population in the nation but a lower-than-average physician to population ratio. Among the most severe shortages are those for primary care physicians, endocrinologists, psychiatrists, geriatricians, and pediatric subspecialists.”

Dan Stultz, M.D., THA president and CEO, said the planning grants come at a crucial time for hospitals facing an increased financial burden from increasing numbers of uninsured patients and state and federal budget cuts. “The 83rd Texas Legislature’s investment is recognition that GME is a public good. Sustaining and building this investment will be essential to ensure that there are enough physicians to meet the health care needs of all Texans,” he said.