Arkansas Colleges of Health Education recently announced a new partnership between the Arkansas College of Osteopathic Medicine in Fort Smith and Unity Health in Searcy to deliver graduate medical education training for its resident physicians.
In addition, the partnership, effective July 1, will include undergraduate medical education training opportunities for ARCOM’s third- and fourth-year students.
ARCOM will provide shared services for Unity Health’s Family Medicine Residency Program, Internal Medicine Residency Program, Psychiatry Residency Program, Emergency Medicine Residency Program and the newly accredited transitional year program. The shared services include faculty appointments, faculty development resources, online library resources for both faculty and residents, scholarly activity resources and other optional services as requested.
Unity Health serves an eight-county area with more than 2,300 associates. It has a total of 438 licensed beds and a medical staff of more than 150 physicians.
“While we know that not all of our residents will remain in Arkansas after residency, affiliating with an Arkansas medical school is an additional way we can work to provide additional physicians for our state. We are very excited about this partnership,” Dr. Dewey McAfee said in a news release. He serves as designated institutional official for the Ray Montgomery Graduate Medical Education department at Unity Health.
Kyle Parker, president and CEO for ACHE, said in the release, “Our goal has been to develop and support residency training programs within institutions where resident physicians receive outstanding training. We believe this partnership with Unity Health is a major step in meeting this goal.”