The University of North Carolina Wilmington announced plans to establish a standalone medical school during a UNC Board of Governors Committee on Educational Planning, Policies and Programs meeting this month – and local officials believe the project could transform regional healthcare access. 

For local leaders and UNCW Chancellor Aswani Volety, it’s a natural step toward keeping pace with the region’s hyper-growth and healthcare needs. 

"When you look at the Wilmington area, southeast North Carolina in general, it is growing a lot faster than the rest of the state,” UNCW Chancellor Aswani Volety told the Business Journal on Tuesday. “And therefore, the need is going to grow."

Woody White, a member of the UNC Board of Governors and Wilmington lawyer, said the state’s population growth has outpaced its expansion of medical education. 

“There hasn’t been a medical school in North Carolina for over 50 years, not a new one,” said White. “But our state doubled in population. Our healthcare needs have grown even faster than that.”

The Board of Governors’ Committee on Educational Planning, Policies and Programs will vote on supporting the medical school on May 20, and the resolution will be considered by the full Board of Governors the next day to support the proposal. If approved, the proposal could advance to the academic planning process. Volety estimates that the entire process, from approval to the first graduates finishing residency, will take at least 10 years. 

"That's one reason why we are pushing that the best time to do it was yesterday, but the second best time is today, because it is a lengthy process,” Volety said. “Overall, this is about a three-year process, and then add four years for the students to graduate, and then they have to do residency, that's another three years."

The proposed medical school would use a distributed clinical model, relying on collaboration with existing and future hospitals, clinics and medical practices in the area. Volety said the school would emphasize clinical practice and include an accelerated three-year track option. 

At the April UNC Board of Governors committee meeting, Volety and New Hanover County Commissioner Dane Scalise, who also serves on UNCW’s Board of Trustees, emphasized the role medical schools play in retaining physicians locally. 

"The statistics show that nearly 70% of physicians who go to a medical school, get their residency done at a medical school, end up staying within that region whenever they graduate,” said Scalise. 

Volety said that a core component of building an established healthcare workforce is continued collaboration with the community. 

“If you want people to practice in these rural areas, you want them to work in those areas, develop relationships, form roots,” Volety said. “That's how you get to keep them."

Local providers have already voiced support for clinical placements and residencies, Volety said.

If the proposal is approved, UNCW would launch a national search for a founding dean to lead hiring and accreditation efforts. The ideal candidate to lead the project, according to Volety, is someone with experience leading a medical school through an accreditation process. 

The first step in accreditation efforts is to conduct a self-study to be submitted to the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME), the accrediting body for medical education programs in the United States. 

Following the study, the LCME would conduct a site visit. If the program meets requirements, it could receive preliminary accreditation, allowing the university to begin recruitment. 

Initial enrollment is projected at 60 students, with the goal of eventually expanding to 120, Volety said. 

Plans for facilities, including simulation labs and teaching spaces, will be determined during the planning and accreditation process. Volety said the university plans to place the medical school near existing healthcare education facilities on UNCW's campus. 

"One of the things we pride ourselves on is interprofessional collaboration,” said Volety. “That way, all the students are interacting. They're sharing spaces, they're learning from each other."

Last year, the university secured a $25 million gift, the largest donation in the university's history, from Yousry and Linda Sayed to fund medical education. Yousry Sayed is a UNCW trustee and founder of Quality Chemical Laboratories, and Linda Sayed, Yousry Sayed's wife, is a Wilmington lawyer, UNCW graduate and former chemistry teacher.

The donation from the Sayeds is allocated over five years and includes the potential to fund planning for the medical school, according to a university spokesperson. 

Volety anticipates additional funding from a mix of state support, philanthropy and tuition. He said the university plans to pursue funding from the New Hanover Community Endowment once the project is further along. 

A total project budget has not yet been determined, Volety said. 

"We're going to have to work out the particulars in terms of exactly how much this is going to cost,” said Scalise. “I can't even hazard a guess at this point."

As for how likely the UNC Board of Governors is to approve the project, White is fairly confident of the proposal’s chances.  

“It would not have been on the April agenda if there wasn’t a lot of support, if not unanimous support, at the board level,” White said.