Michigan State University College of Osteopathic Medicine offers a combined degree program leading to the D.O. and Ph.D. degrees for highly motivated students who have achieved excellence in research and academics. The purpose of this program is to prepare these select students for careers in biomedical research or academic medicine. Students in the program dedicate themselves to seven or more years of education and training to become medical scientists. Their training will enable them to become physician-scientists working in clinical or basic science research. They may either work mainly with patients in a hospital or clinic or as physicians working in the basic sciences with research animals or cells in the laboratory.
Most graduates of the D.O. Ph.D. will seek careers in osteopathic medical colleges, universities, or major medical research centers. These physician-scientists bridge the gap between basic science and clinical practice. However, the national reserve of physician-scientists has seriously decreased in recent years. For Osteopathic Medicine, the need for physician scientists is critical. To meet this need MSU COM has developed its D.O. Ph.D. Program.
Other Ph.D. programs at MSU will be considered on an individual basis.
A student who wants to be more than a clinician, wants to know not only how to treat a patient's illness, but also the scientific basis for the illnesses that affects patients, and wants to work to in the research laboratory to find a better understanding of this and new therapies to treat patients.
DO-PhD Degree
- Reward of translating research into patient therapy
- Finding an answer to a medical puzzle
- Be on the cutting edge of science in finding new therapies and/or cures for disease
- Students in the DO PhD Program receive stipends and significant tuition reductions
- NIH Clinical Research Loan Repayment Program LRP-In exchange for a two-year commitment to a clinical research career, NIH will repay up to $35,000 per year of education debt for up to two years
- The physician scientist population in the US is smaller and older than it was 25 years ago
- The physician scientist is an endangered species (JAMA Vol294,1343, 2005)
- The physician scientist is a vital member of the medical research community
- The physician scientist can collaborate with PhD scientists and health care providers
- Scientific questions the physician scientist asks reflect their experiences with the care of sick people
Breakthroughs as:
Oncogenes
Pulmonary Surfactinsfor Premature Deaths
Identification of Defective Genes in disorders
Development of open-heart surgery
Near-eradication of Polio
Physician Scientist
at Work
“One day a man appeared at the Massachusetts General Hospital infectious-diseases Clinic and offered himself up for research. He had been infected with AIDS since 1978, but had never shown any signs of AIDS. "I feel great· You might want to study me”[he told the physician]. “Dr. Bruce D. Walker recalls, "We started studying him like crazy”. The encounter ultimately produced a wealth of results, chief among them the discovery of a unique immune-system response that’s missing in patients who suffer from progressive HIV disease”
This is a an example of how physicians meet at the junction of clinical medicine and laboratory research. Physician-scientists spend their careers between the bench and the bedside, positive that the best science cannot be conducted in the absence of patient contact.
From the HHMI Bulletin Dec 2002
