The Warren Foundation and Saint Francis establish a $10 million scholarship endowment for the OU-TU School of Community Medicine.
Dr. Gerard Clancy is the vice president for health affairs at TU. He said a lot has been done to get the school’s facilities and an endowment for faculty set up.
"And now, this component adds scholarships for our students, that we can recruit some of the very best students to be in the medical school and to graduate and hopefully practice in Oklahoma — a state that is very short on physicians — as we look to the future," Clancy said.
Foundation CEO John-Kelly Warren said Oklahoma ranks 48th in the number of primary-care doctors per 100,000 residents.
"And this is unacceptable to us. We need to focus in on higher ed to reverse this trend and have homegrown physicians," Warren said.
Merit-based scholarships will be available when the school opens this fall.
Clancy said the state's physician shortage comes down to an aging population needing more care and already overworked doctors getting ready to retire.
KWGS is affiliated with the University of Tulsa.
