Speights: There is Tremendous Progress

NYITCOM-Arkansas Site Dean Shane Speights, D.O., is featured in Arkansas Business as he answers questions about the growing number of residencies in the state’s rural areas. As he notes, residency opportunities for graduating medical students have increased greatly since NYITCOM-Arkansas opened as the state’s first osteopathic medical school in 2016, with another D.O. school opening elsewhere in the state soon after.

“There’s been tremendous progress. Prior to 2015, residency training in Arkansas was only being done in academic institutions,” said Speights. “When the two osteopathic schools opened, we helped a number of community hospitals understand the need and opportunity that existed to start new programs. Over the last 10 years, there have been 26 new residency programs opened in the state, accounting for more than 220 annual positions. The osteopathic schools were responsible for 20 of those new [residency] programs.”

NYITCOM’s Jonesboro, Ark., medical school location seeks to educate, train, and position more physicians in the Mississippi Delta region, a medically underserved area of the United States.