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University of Utah General Catalog 2002-2003
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| MEDICINE
School of Medicine The curriculum leading to the degree of Doctor of Medicine is accredited by the AAMC-AMA Liaison Committee on Medical Education. University Hospital is accredited by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations. Its 49 graduate medical education programs are accredited by the Accreditation Council on Graduate Medical Education and its associated residency review committees. The Medical Laboratory Science curriculum is accredited by the Committee on Allied Health Education and Accreditation. The Physician Assistant Program is approved by the American Medical Association. Senior Vice President for Health Sciences/Dean, School of Medicine, A. Lorris Betz, M.D., Ph.D. Senior Associate Dean, David J. Bjorkman, M.D., M.S.P.H., (H.S.A.), S.M. (Epid.) Associate Dean, Admissions, Victoria E. Judd, M.D. Associate Dean, Continuing Medical Education, Victoria E. Judd, M.D. Associate Dean, Finance, Glenn E. Warnick Associate Dean, Medical Graphics and Photography, Victoria E. Judd, M.D. Associate Dean, Research, Jerry Kaplan, Ph.D. M.D., MSPH/HSA Associate Dean, Student Affairs and Education, Elizabeth M. Allen, M.D. Associate Dean, Veterans Affairs, Ronald Gebhart, M.D. Assistant Dean, Curriculum, Larry Reimer, M.D. Assistant Dean, Dental Education, G. Lynn Powell, D.D.S. Assistant Dean, Graduate Medical Education, Larry Reimer, M.D. Assistant Dean, Idaho Affairs, DeVon C. Hale, M.D. Office: 1C100 School of Medicine, 581-7201
Departments Anesthesiology
Degrees
Certificate
M.D. Degree Program The University of Utah School of Medicine accepts a class of 102 students annually. Students from the state of Utah are given preference in the admissions process. The School of Medicine is fully accredited by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME), the national body accrediting medical schools. Candidates for the M.D. degree must complete the four-year curriculum consisting of 152 weeks of instruction, must pass satisfactorily all courses required by the School of Medicine, and must pass Step 1 and Step 2 of the United States Medical Licensing Examinations (USMLE) in order to graduate. Classes offered in the first and second year provide the scientific foundation of medicine. In the third and fourth year, which take place in clinical settings, students participate in the care of patients. Major courses in the first year include anatomy, biochemistry, genetics, microbiology, and immunology. Second-year courses include neuroscience, physiology, pharmacology, pathology, and multi-disciplinary courses organized around the body's organ systems. Courses that span both years I and II of the curriculum include the art of medicine, evidence-based medicine, social medicine, and clinical experience. During the third year, students rotate through a series of clinical clerkships in patient care units both in the hospital and in ambulatory clinics. They participate with other members of the health care team in the diagnosis and management of patients in the following clerkships: pediatrics, internal medicine, family medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, surgery, psychiatry, and neurology. The fourth year allows students the opportunity to broaden their educational horizons through the pursuit of individually designed elective programs. Electives are available in a wide variety of medical specialties and subspecialties. The medical school makes a special effort to attract into medical education students from diverse cultural, educational, economic, and ethnic backgrounds. Each applicant is evaluated for the contribution that person can make to the student body or the medical profession, as well as for evidence of academic ability and motivation for medical study. In order to take any courses in the School of Medicine, students registered in other schools or colleges of the University must meet the requirements for admission and be accepted for the four-year curriculum in medicine. The University of Utah also offers a complete graduate medical education program with residencies and fellowships in 52 specialties and subspecialties. Premedical Course Requirements. The prerequisites for admission to the University of Utah School of Medicine include: CHEMISTRY: Two years; the general chemistry series including quantitative and qualitative analysis (AP credit accepted if at a level 4 or 5), and the organic series, both with a laboratory. PHYSICS: One year with a laboratory. COMMUNICATION/WRITING/SPEECH: One year of communication/writing/speech. The writing courses taken must be classified as a writing intensive class by the school attended. BIOLOGY: Two college courses in biology. One course must be in cellular biology or biochemistry. (No substitutions.) SOCIAL SCIENCE: A college course in social science. HUMANITIES: A college course in humanities. DIVERSITY: A college course that has its central focus on the
culture, history and/or current circumstances of one or more non-dominant
groups in the United
All prerequisites must be completed prior to medical school matriculation. All premedical course work must be completed at an accredited college or university in the United States or Canada. MCAT SCORES: MCAT scores are required of all applicants; the test must be taken within three years of application year. Mathematics, statistics, physiology, anatomy, human behavior, and computer literacy classes are not required, but are recommended. Many of the chemistry and physics courses require mathematics as prerequisites. Any AP, CLEP, independent study, online, or correspondence credit will not be accepted for these requirements (except for general chemistry, as noted above). The University of Utah School of Medicine does not recommend any specific undergraduate academic majors. We suggest that students choose a major that they are interested in and which provides a base for an alternate career if they should not be accepted as a relatively small percentage of applicants are selected. A bachelor’s degree and the completion of four years of college credit are required before entering the University of Utah School of medicine. Only applicants who have completed most of their schooling in an accredited U.S. or Canadian college or university will be considered. University of Utah premedicine students should contact Marilyn Hoffman
in the Department of Biology at (801) 581-5744. The premedical advisers
are familiar with the admissions requirements of most medical schools.
Students need not be “traditional” premedical students to avail themselves
of the advisers expertise.
Admission. Students considering the study of medicine at the University should: 1. Take the MCAT given annually in the spring and autumn. Application forms for this test may be obtained through your premedical adviser or the University Testing Center, 498 Student Services Building (201 S. 1460 E., Rm. 498, Salt Lake City, UT 84112-9059), or MCAT Registration, The American College Testing Program, P.O. Box 414, Iowa City, IA 52240. 2. Obtain an AMCAS application request form from any college premedicine office or from: Association of American Medical Colleges, www.aamc.org/students/amcas/start.htm, or 2501 M Street N.W., Lobby 26, Washington, D.C. 20037. 3. Upon request, submit additional information. 4. Visit our website for detailed information at www.med.utah.edu/som Acceptance is contingent upon the successful completion of a student's projected course work. Each entering class is limited to 102 students. Transfer positions to the medical school are not available, unless the transferring student's spouse is on our medical school faculty or in one of our postgraduate residency training programs. Transfer students are accepted in the third year only, and only from a U.S. or Canadian accredited medical school. Nonmatriculated Students. Students who are not fully matriculated medical students or graduate students in one of the departments of the School of Medicine are not eligible to participate in the school's course offerings. Course Registration. Medical students are registered by the School of Medicine at the beginning of each semester. Medical students who wish to register for classes outside of the regular medical school curriculum may do so by making arrangements through the medical school Office of Student Affairs. M.P.H./M.Stat./M.S.P.H. Degrees For information about the Master of Public Health, Master of Statistics
in Biostatistics, and Master of Science in Public Health degree programs,
see Family and Preventive Medicine in the Courses section of this catalog.
Academic Degrees Graduate Degrees. Eight School of Medicine departments offer programs leading to the Ph.D. or M.S. degree. Departments awarding Ph.D. degrees and participating in the joint M.D./ Ph.D. program are Biochemistry, Human Genetics, Medical Informatics, Neurobiology and Anatomy, Oncological Sciences, Pathology, and Physiology. Departments offering programs leading to an M.S. degree are Family and Preventive Medicine (in public health), Medical Informatics, Oncological Sciences, and Pathology (in medical laboratory science or experimental pathology). The School of Medicine participates in one interdisciplinary degree-granting program: neuroscience. In addition, the school participates in two other interdisciplinary graduate programs: molecular biology and biological chemistry. All graduate academic degrees are awarded through The Graduate School. For more detailed information on these programs, refer to the Graduate Information section and individual department listings in the Courses section of this catalog, or consult the Bulletin of the University of Utah, The Graduate School. Bachelor's Degrees. Students from the University of Utah admitted to medical school may use credits earned during the first year of medical school toward a B.A. or B.S. degree with a major in medical biology. For information, see Science elsewhere in this section of the catalog. The Department of Pathology administers the undergraduate program in medical laboratory science. The program has two components—cytotechnology and medical technology. Students who successfully complete the cytotechnology or medical technology specialty receive bachelor's degrees and are eligible for certification by the appropriate national certifying agency. For information, see Medical Laboratory Science in the Courses section of this catalog. Physician Assistant Program The School of Medicine has offered the Physician Assistant Program (formerly Utah MEDEX Program) since 1971. It is one of 100 such programs in the United States approved by the Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs (CAAHEP). For program information, see Family and Preventive Medicine in the Courses section of this catalog. Health Sciences Center The University of Utah Health Sciences Center facilitates coordination and communication among the health-related colleges. Included in the center are the School of Medicine; University of Utah Hospitals and Clinics; University of Utah Health Network; colleges of Pharmacy, Nursing, and Health; Spencer S. Eccles Health Sciences Library; Student Health Service; and Regional Dental Education Program. This unit provides closer coordination of educational and patient-care programs common to two or more health-science components. The colleges retain their identities and continue to be administered by their respective deans. Each dean is a member of the University's Health Sciences Senior Leadership Council, which allows direct input into the center's administration. Research Facilities The School of Medicine and its adjacent buildings house numerous laboratories, many of which are internationally known. Graduate programs in genetics, molecular biology, and biochemistry were ranked by the National Research Council among the top 50 doctoral programs in the country. Research programs in biomedical engineering and artificial organs bring together the talents of scientists in the School of Medicine and College of Engineering, as well as scholars from other disciplines. Projects include the development and refinement of artificial organs such as the heart, ear, and eye. Genetic research at the University has grown dramatically since completion of the George and Dolores Eccles Institute of Human Genetics in 1990. The research facility was funded jointly by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the George and Dolores Eccles Foundation. The center has 75 laboratories with core facilities that support each research group. There are now 33 investigators and 290 research and support staff at the institute. Research at the center is supported by federal, state, and private funding. The Eccles Institute of Human Genetics has become a center for interdisciplinary research, education, and training for molecular biology and human genetics. In addition to the Department of Human Genetics, the Eccles Institute houses the following three research programs: The Howard Hughes Medical Institute supports six investigators and their research projects in molecular biology and genetics in both human and animal systems. The institute is known for its studies of genes including their function, regulation, and expression. The Eccles Program for Human Molecular Biology and Genetics is a consortium of scientists and physicians with a focus on human biology and disease using the tools of molecular biology to discover inherited cell defects that lead to disease. This program now has 14 investigators. The Utah Genome Center is one of seven national centers for the Human Genome Project which is designed to fully characterize the genome of humans and selected model organisms. The center includes six investigators and directors in addition to providing core services for research throughout the Eccles Institute. The School of Medicine has a clinical research center which has been funded continuously by the National Institutes of Health for more than 30 years. The John A. Dixon Laser Institute brings together physicians in approximately 15 medical specialties with basic science researchers in physics, chemistry, materials engineering, electrical engineering, and materials science. The institute's clinical division is one of the nation's broadest, performing some 1,500 procedures annually. The Center for Diagnostic Imaging Research in the Department of Radiology combines the talents of physicists, computer scientists, electrical and biomedical engineers, cardiologists, neurosurgeons, and radiologists all pursuing state-of-the-art advances in X-ray and magnetic resonance imaging techniques. The center's main areas of research focus on three-dimensional X-ray imaging, noninvasive magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of vascular anatomy, blood flow quantification and electronic X-ray image acquisition, and digital imaging processing. Research at the Nora Eccles Harrison Cardiovascular Research and Training Institute focuses on cardiac electrophysiology, with investigative expertise ranging from the molecular/cellular level to the whole heart. Two other major areas of cellular research are excitation-contraction coupling and intracellular pH regulation. The Institute is presently composed of eleven investigators with expertise in membrane biophysics, biological electrical fields, mathematical modeling of cardiac electrical activity, the structural properties of ion channels, and the neural control of cardiac activity. The federally funded Utah Cancer Center involves more than 100 funded investigators from 20 departments at the University of Utah, working in the following areas of research: cellular and immunobiology, clinical investigation, epidemiology, experimental oncology, genetics, molecular biology, and radiobiology. The Universitys commitment to the fight against cancer has been dramatically enhanced by generous donations of the Jon M. Huntsman family. Gifts totaling $225 million have funded the development of a world-class cancer research institute, which opened in 1999, and construction of a 50-bed cancer research hospital, which is scheduled for completion in July 2004. The two connected facilities allow for a uniquely integrated patient care and research program, enabling scientists and doctors to rapidly translate new discoveries into effective cancer treatments. The five-story Biomedical Polymers Research Building, which opened in 1994, adds 100,000 square feet of research space. It is shared by the medical school and the colleges of Engineering and Pharmacy. Other prominent facilities include the Center for Human Toxicology; Center for Infectious Diseases, Diagnostic Microbiology and Immunology; and the Utah Resource for Genetic and Epidemiologic Research. Each School of Medicine department and division maintains its own laboratories. These facilities are generally supported by grants from government agencies, philanthropic organizations, and commercial concerns. Recently, the Markey Foundation donated $2 million to support and enhance the interdisciplinary research between investigators in biological and genetic science and clinical medicine. This wide variety of research brings many tangible and intangible benefits to the school and its students. These benefits include an enlarged faculty for classroom teaching in all aspects of medicine, worldwide contacts for the faculty that enhance and broaden the educational program, opportunities for student participation in research either during summer fellowships or the post-sophomore research years, and significant contributions to the advancement of scientific knowledge. |
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