Founding dean of UNC’s osteopathic medical school prescribes a path for state’s third medical college

For the past six months, Dr. Beth Longenecker has engaged in juggling, planning, budgeting and imagining at the University of Northern Colorado.

Building a college of osteopathic medicine is a labor-intensive effort, and while Longenecker has experience with a start-up as part of more than 20 years in medical education, a couple of her current tasks are new, such as fundraising about $150 million and finding a physical location for the school.

As the founding dean of the proposed college, Longenecker didn’t turn first to those issues when she arrived in Greeley last summer. They remain important and ongoing in the larger picture of building the college.

At the top of her to-do list was to write a plan for the school’s mission, vision and values — an in-progress document Longenecker called the “driver” of the college.

The mission, vision and values will set the UNC school with a structure while defining its culture and identity for faculty and staff.

“How do we treat each other as the folks who work at the medical school? And how do you model that kind of conversation and identity to our students so they’re more effective with their patients?” Longenecker asked.

Longenecker’s start in June and her work into the middle of next year represents the latest step in the university’s lengthy journey to opening the third medical school in Colorado. While UNC could welcome students in 2025 or 2026 — they’re working toward both dates  — the effort remains in the early stages of development.

Since UNC President Andy Feinstein introduced his idea to the UNC community for the medical college in July 2021, university leaders have moved deliberately with the vision of filling a need for the looming shortage of physicians and other health care professionals statewide.

Data from consulting firm Tripp Umbach for a feasibility study on the new school reported more than 1,700 primary care physicians will be needed in Colorado by 2030 — a 49% increase over the past decade. The study also said Colorado has the 10th highest rate in the U.S. of active physicians older than 60. In 2019, nearly 30% of Colorado physicians were at least 60.

GREELEY, CO – NOVEMBER 16:Dr. Brenda Campos-Spitze is sworn in by board president Michael Mathews after being appointed to the Greeley-Evans School District 6 Board of Education at the District 6 Administration Building in Greeley Nov. 16, 2022. Campos-Spitze will fill the seat vacated by Pepper Mueller. (Alex McIntyre/Staff Photographer)

“The physician workforce isn’t growing,” said Dr. Brenda Campos-Spitze, a Sunrise Community Health family physician who was named to Longenecker’s advisory board for the new school. “So what happens is — those of us who are here — while our patient panels should only be this big to responsibly care for patients, we have so many more patients. If the school will bring more physicians into the community, I think that would be a huge service, especially if the physicians they’re training are interested in working with underserved populations.”

Longenecker’s advisory committee is comprised of representatives from the Greeley community, UNC and five northern Colorado physicians. Campos-Spitze earlier this month was appointed to the Greeley-Evans School District Board of Education. She wanted to serve on the advisory committee to help create a link for District 6 students to get into UNC and the college of osteopathic medicine.

The school district has a health and science academy pathway with courses at Greeley Central High School. In her medical training, Campos-Spitze has seen a “pipeline” program beginning with K-12 students and running through college and medical schools.

“That would be my life dream to create a similar program here in Greeley,” Campos-Spitze said. “It’s been done before, and I think it can be done again.”

The other four physicians on the advisory committee are Dr. Mark Wallace, chief clinical officer at Sunrise Community Health, former executive director of the Weld County Department of Public Health and Environment and a UNC graduate; Dr. Brian Davidson, an early supporter of the medical college, a regional physician executive with Banner Health and a UNC graduate;  Dr. Maurice Lyons, a Banner Health cardiothoracic surgeon who’s also backed the UNC school; and Dr. Seth Septer, a pediatric gastroenterologist at Denver Children’s Hospital and UNC graduate.

Wallace, Campos-Spitze and Davidson are medical doctors. Lyons and Septer are doctors of osteopathic medicine . Graduates of allopathic medical programs receive a doctor of medicine, or MD, as an academic degree. Graduates of osteopathic programs receive a doctor of osteopathic medicine, or DO. Students coming out of MD and DO schools continue their training in residency, and they must pass the same licensing examination before they can treat others and prescribe medication.

Cardiologists Dr. Jason Hatch, left, and Dr. Maurice Lyons stand for a photo in the operating room at Banner Health North Colorado Medical Center Nov. 23, 2021 in Greeley. Hatch, an MD, and Lyons, a DO, said they hope to work closely with students in the proposed osteopathic medical school at the University of Northern Colorado. (Alex McIntyre/Staff Photographer)

Other members of the advisory committee include UNC graduate John Schmidt, a co-CEO of WeFi Technology Group and managing partner of Jam Capital LLC; Tom Grant, a Greeley attorney and chairman of the board of the Weld Trust; Ben Snow, Greeley’s director of the department of economic health and housing; Kamel Haddad, dean of UNC College of Natural and Health Sciences; Melissa Henry, director of  UNC School of Nursing; Jeri-Anne Lyons, UNC associate vice president of research and dean of the graduate school; Mit McLaughlin, chairman of UNC department of biological sciences; Yvette Lucero-Nguyen, director of Stryker Institute for Leadership Development & Center for Women’s and Gender Equity at UNC; and Shukuru Rushanika, a UNC undergraduate studying pre-med.

Longenecker created the advisory committee when realized she needed a “sounding board” and help in building the college. Longenecker earned a doctor of osteopathic medicine degree from the Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine in 1991. She was the dean of the Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine’s Athens Campus for three years before coming to UNC. She was just the second female dean at OU-HCOM since its creation in 1975.

Longenecker’s background also includes work as an associate dean of clinical education at Midwestern University’s Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine and associate dean of clinical services at William Carey University’s College of Osteopathic Medicine in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.

Longenecker wanted to take on the role of founding dean at UNC partly because of the challenge. Longenecker went into emergency medicine after graduating from medical school. During her senior year of residency, she was asked by program directors and faculty why she had not considered teaching for her next job.

GREELEY, CO – NOVEMBER 22:Dr. Beth Longenecker, founding dean of the proposed college of osteopathic medicine at the University of Northern Colorado, speaks to the Tribune in her office in Carter Hall at UNC in Greeley Nov. 22, 2022. (Alex McIntyre/Staff Photographer)

Longenecker was chief resident for one year in the late 1990s at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center in Newark, New Jersey. She applied for faculty positions in New York City and later was a program director of an emergency medicine residency program in Miami. Longenecker eventually earned a master’s degree in medical education.

“Looking at this, the fact that it was a public university really was a draw,” she said. “The fact that there is such a physician need in the state was a draw. It kind of hit all the buttons of, ‘They really need another medical school there.’ This would be a great environment in which to create this osteopathic medical school.”

Another key part of Longenecker’s work as the founding dean is leading UNC through the accreditation process. UNC will do this through the Commission on Osteopathic Accreditation, which is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. Commission accreditation signifies a college has met or exceeded standards for educational quality.

UNC is in the applicant status phase, which is the first step on the path to accreditation.

Earlier this year, UNC succeeded in advocating for legislation allowing it to offer doctor of osteopathy degrees. There was a longstanding state statute granting the University of Colorado the right to be the only public medical school in Colorado.

Gov. Jared Polis signed the bipartisan bill authorizing UNC’s school in March.

The other existing medical school in Colorado is Rocky Vista University College of Osteopathic Medicine, a private institution with a campus in Parker. As a private medical college, Rocky Vista did not need to address the state statute relating to the University of Colorado. Rocky Vista was established in 2006 and opened to students in 2008.

Longenecker said UNC can’t move to the next step in the accreditation process until she’s been in the founding dean role for one year. This allows the dean time to work on the school’s mission, figuring out matters such as hiring and determining a broad look at curriculum.

The next phase will be known as candidate status, when UNC will bring in faculty, narrow in on curriculum and create policies for students. Next will be pre-accreditation, when UNC may begin recruiting students and marketing the college.

GREELEY, CO – APRIL 19:University of Northern Colorado President Andy Feinstein, center, speaks alongside Sunrise Community Health CEO Mitzi Moran, right, and Greeley Mayor John Gates, left, during a visit by U.S. Senator John Hickenlooper to meet with local healthcare leaders, educators and students at Banner North Colorado Medical Center in Greeley April 19, 2022. (Alex McIntyre/Staff Photographer)

Longenecker said colleges of osteopathic medicine have seven years to graduate their first class once arriving at the candidate phase. The school has five years to graduate the first class at the pre-accreditation step.

Longenecker said the medical school’s integration into the university at large will be unique.

“UNC is the perfect culture to create this really meshed medical school,” Longenecker said. “We have a chance within the university community to leverage expertise that you don’t see in the average medical where we can really integrate the folks with expertise in communication with others to help inform our curriculum.”

Longenecker has heard from representatives in the communications department asking to interact with future medical students to help them be more effective in communicating with patients. She’s also heard from representatives from education and business departments too, inquiring about how they might contribute to the medical college’s work on teaching and guiding students through the debt process.

The average debt of a graduating medical student is about $250,000, Longenecker said.

Longenecker’s experience in osteopathic medicine and administration also includes work as a site inspector in the accreditation process at other institutions.

“It’s great background to actually know what they’ve done and how they’ve started their schools,” she said

The advisory committee at UNC has provided Longenecker feedback on the mission, vision and values. The content remains in draft form, and it’s scheduled to go to the UNC board of trustees for approval in February.

Longenecker and UNC hope to have a better idea on a location for the medical college in January. Multiple options are being evaluated with a program planner, SmithGroup, including UNC’s Bishop-Lehr Hall on 20th Street. Longenecker said the location will depend on funding — if the university can build a new building or if it will look to remodel or renovate.

GREELEY, CO – JULY 15:A rust-pocked staircase leads toward the building as the sun sets over Bishop-Lehr Hall on the University of Northern Colorado campus in Greeley July 15, 2021. (Alex McIntyre/Staff Photographer)

The university is also working on program plans for the next 10 years, Longenecker said, and the results of those plans are related to or likely impact the medical school effort.

She said the medical college will need a building with about 100,000 square feet. Though the cost analysis is yet to be completed, Longenecker said the cost to furnish and equip the building will be between $75 million to $85 million.

Other dollar figures in the plans for the medical college are:

• $42 million for a teach-out escrow, which is a contingency fund in the event accreditation does not come through and UNC needs to reimburse students;
• $6.5 million currently collected to allow the college to operate for its first two years and maybe into the third year; and
• $22 million to be raised for operational expenses to help the college until it reaches its financial break-even point that should come in the third year of students as it begins to bring in more tuition revenue.

The university is strategizing to determine how to source this funding. Funds will be raised through a variety of avenues — mainly through philanthropy, but “opportunities are also being explored for one-time state and local government support and partnerships.”

Dr. Mark Wallace, chief clinical officer for Sunrise Community Health and former director of the Weld County Department of Public Health and Environment. (Greeley Tribune file).

Diversity, equity and inclusion will be a focus of the school, Longenecker said. UNC has an undergraduate population that is about 25% Hispanic/Latino, and this area of northern Colorado is home to a rapidly growing Latino population.

There were 62.5 million people of Latino descent in the U.S. last year comprising 19% of the total population, according to Pew Research Center. Yet, only 6% of all practicing physicians nationwide are Latino.

It’s a statistic both Longenecker and Campos-Spitze want to change — by looking at how they might educate Latino communities about opportunities in health care.

Working with students early in their schooling and determining where pipeline programs might be established can help address the inequality, Longenecker and Campos-Spitze said.

“Recruit all the way from high school through undergraduate into a medical school to provide those opportunities for students to realize, ‘I could be a doctor and go back home and take care of my community,’” Longenecker said.

Developing this reality is a value of the school as it’s currently outlined. There are also questions about how pipeline programs will be set up and where they’ll be located, and a matter of how to guide and serve first-generation students. Longenecker said 41% of UNC students in undergraduate programs are first-generation college students, meaning their parents did not earn a four-year degree.

There is “a desperate need” for physicians in the rural U.S., Longenecker said. Of the more than 7,200 federally designated health professional shortage areas, three of five are in rural areas, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. The AAMC says 20% of the U.S. population lives in rural communities, but only 11% of physicians practice in those areas.

A University of Colorado School of Medicine spokesperson said late last year there are two key factors in determining where doctors settle to practice: the location of their residency training and where they were raised or grew up.

More than 50% of doctors remain in the state where they worked as residents, according to data from the Association of American Medical Colleges. The association said last year 57.1% of residents who completed their training from 2011-2020 continued to practice in the state where they finished their residencies.

“If I can recruit someone from a rural environment who’s used to living in a town of under 10,000, they’re more likely to go home or go to another community of that size,” Longenecker said.

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