The Board of Regents at WSU supported working to create a medical school in Spokane by a 100 percent vote.

Investigating these options is currently the number one priority for the board.

Ron Sims, a member of the board, observed the disparity in doctor distribution across the state.

“Nearly half of doctors in Washington state, including me, are in King County – 49 percent,” Sims said. “Rural counties all over Washington are struggling.”

Another member, Harold Cochran, noted that 46,000 families signed up for healthcare this year, but a limited number of doctors in some places created a challenge.

“Some counties have little to no access to a robust hospital structure,” Cochran said.

The creation of the medical school could integrate future doctors into communities throughout rural Washington.

The mass of academic medical programs at WSU Spokane makes it an easy transition for this big change.

The college already houses the nursing school as well as the pharmaceutical education center. With the addition of Spokane’s newest building on campus, they already have enough resources to house more medical students without a large amount of funding.

According to medicine.wsu.edu, the University of Washington hosts 120 in state medical students a year and fewer than half do their residency in state. With the expansion, more Washington students would have the opportunity to stay, and increase the physician population.

“The medical program at UW is willing to collaborate with the new proposed program,” Dean Kenneth Roberts said. “This would diminish the competition between the two schools, because their goals are separate.”

Reporting by Haley Watkins