Thursday, November 25, 2010

A response to Hopkins, Lowry, Weiss: Why a Fort Worth M.D. school makes sense

The following satire by Phil Goodman, MD to the editorial on Star-Telegram

Maybe Ransom is doing that on purpose to confuse people and gain more support....

He is trying to send out propaganda that the State is getting a medical school at no cost for the first 5 years. There will be a $1.5 billion boost to the local economy. Solves the doctor shortage in Tarrant County and the State of Texas will benefit, too. UNT System potentially improves to Tier-One status. All that and it's completely free to everyone. I mean, it's a win-win. No downside (his propaganda).

According to him, he can do it cheaper than anyone else because the infrastructure's already there (never mind about the $90 million Legislative Appropriation Request because those improvements are needed regardless...blink...blink).

Also, according to him, he's got all the money he needs from private donors so all the State has to do is sit back and reap the benefits. It will not affect the state budget.

  • One wonders what would happen if half way into his 5 year plan, the cost overruns got too high and the donor pledges didn't go through (e.g., they changed their minds) and he ran out of money.
  •  What would happen to those MD students? Is he gonna leave the State holding the bag?
  • Would expanding the current med school program (TCOM) make better sense?  
  • Rather than creating a parallel administrative structure and another bureaucracy (i.e. increase operating costs) and potentially affecting the TCOM program as well potentially increasing costs to the state, expanding the TCOM program would be a much better way of using state and private resources- a much better and more innovative way of private-public cooperation at solving the doc shortage problem. 

A wise person once told me, “Sometimes, the BEST solution is the SIMPLEST one.”
  • Quit trying to reinvent the wheel and fix what's not broken. TCOM works!
  • They readily admit that it's a top-notch program and it's already doing what it supposed to do- produce quality docs for Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas, the U.S., etc.
  • Why not expand what's already outstanding and produce more docs from the program to help with the doctor shortage?

In other words, why tamper with success by creating something else similar and risk damaging what is already quite successful?
  • What's wrong with dancing with the girl (TCOM) you’re with?
  • What’s wrong with going home with the same one (DO) that brung you?
  • Different is not necessarily better or more successful. TCOM has the formula that works, period.
  • Don't divorce it, don't abandon it and don't break the very rice bowl that for years fed you.
  • Show me a man without loyalty and I'll show you a man without destiny.
  • Know where one comes from so you can know where to go 

Ransom is single-handedly trying to destroy 100 years of TCOM osteopathic heritage, of hard work, of overwhelming success in pursuit of his own narrow-minded and destructive agenda.  Why does Ransom intent upon burying his own osteopathic heritage?

In pursuit of this short-sighted ambition, it's really amazing that he's promising everything except the cure for cancer....maybe he'll promise that too if the state would agree to his $90 million for the MD school (oops, officially.. research building to cure cancer!!!). 


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