The American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians (ACOFP) named Richard Terry (D.O. ’88) its 2012 Osteopathic Family Medicine Educator of the Year at its annual convention in March. He currently serves as chief academic officer of the Lake Erie (Pa.) Consortium for Medical Training as well as director of medical education at Wilson Regional Medical Center/United Health Services in Johnson City, N.Y. This July, he begins a new position as assistant dean for Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine.

NYIT Magazine had the opportunity to sit down with Terry as he explained his philosophy on medical education and the future of osteopathic medicine.

First, congratulations on your ACOFP recognition. Why do you think they chose to recognize you?

One of the most important aspects of teaching is giving feedback in addition to getting patients to remember what we offer. There is an identity crisis between allopathic institutions, and D.O.s forget their osteopathic foundation. I address what our value is by promoting how it’s the most holistic approach, with the ability for doctors to perform manual medicine with their hands and an emphasis on family care. Those are the key principles of osteopathic medicine.

What are the greatest obstacles facing osteopathic physicians?

The greatest obstacle is us. We don’t advertise ourselves as D.O.s. Some are ashamed or some are afraid to show off their abilities. Only 10 percent of D.O.s practicing actually do osteopathic manipulation. We’re our own worst enemy by not advertising what we offer. There are still not enough osteopathic training sites, so many students choose allopathic training instead. We need to be more geographically diverse so we can offer ample training opportunities. 

Speaking to that, how would you rate how we train osteopathic physicians?

We have to be careful of our growth to make sure we are giving enough individual mentoring. The biggest difference I’ve made is to offer mentoring for all of my students, no matter what their level. I think sometimes that gets lost because there are not enough mentors for students in their formative years.

Are there growth opportunities for osteopathic medical education?

The key is more post-graduate education. The growth is in developing those programs for D.O.s who have graduated to give them more learning opportunities. This is going to be difficult because the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education is drawing the lines on osteopathic training opportunities due to more M.D.s graduating. For students, we have to develop more purely osteopathic training centers.

—Michael Schiavetta (M.A. ’07) 

More Alumni Notes

Vol. 10 No. 2 Table of Contents