Medical school study

Twenty-five years ago, when lawmakers proposed starting a medical school at the University of Maine, they had little trouble developing good reasons for wanting one. Primarily the concerns were about quality of care and a shortage of doctors in rural areas. Today, those needs persist and new ones have arisen. The Legislature should take seriously Sen. John Martin’s reintroduction of this plan and approve funds to update the 1975 medical-school study.

The need for improved rural health care has been well documented, and is reflected in the choices of care for a patient, the ability to take advantage of preventative medicine and the cost of receiving care. The case is equally compelling for doctors practicing in rural areas: a shortage of doctors forces them to take on too many hours of work and leaves them without local colleagues to consult; a specialist on weekend duty could be responsible for half the state.

The 1975 proposal passed the Legislature but was vetoed by Gov. Jim Longley. The former governor’s icy relationship with the university system was famous at the time, so his refusal to support a medical school may have said less about the quality of the proposal than about politics. The problems first identified then, however, have persisted and new opportunities that make a medical school an even better idea have arisen since.

For instance, nursing or medical-support programs have been established at Eastern Maine Technical College, Husson College and University College in Bangor in addition to UMaine’s program. Their students could benefit from the added resources of a medical school. Maine’s efforts to expand its capacity for research and development would be improved by a medical school that could attract grant money from the National Institutes of Health. And a medical school could improve the sometimes-uneasy relationship between Eastern Maine Medical Center and St. Joseph Hospital, which could only help the region by generating other opportunities to jointly serve patients.

The next step is for the University of Maine to show its enthusiasm for, at a minimum, studying the issue in depth. The study might look particularly at niches in rural health care in which a medical school could specialize, serving Maine by developing expertise in areas other schools do not address. It might look for ways a school could help doctors in rural areas connect with colleagues or offer continuing education of particular need.

Sen. Martin deserves credit for returning the Legislature’s attention to this important idea. Lawmakers should have no trouble understanding how their districts and the state would benefit from a medical school, and should support a study to examine it in greater depth.