WSU’s Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine gets legislative win, will grow class size

SPOKANE, Wash. — Twenty more students will be added to the incoming classes at WSU’s Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine, growing the student population from 60 up to 80.

“We recruit all our students from Washington, particularly, rural or under-served areas, and our plan is to train them in those areas, in hopes they will practice right there and stay in the state of Washington,” said the college’s founding dean, John Tomkowiak.

He notes that training more doctors combined with the aforementioned recruitment strategy will hopefully help in equalizing access to medical care.

“In more rural areas, access is a big one,” he said, “just getting to appointments and following up in a timely way is really a big problem.”

He says that access to particular types of therapies, especially ones that require personnel to be there in person can be hard.

“Even sometimes getting medications, just on an as needed basis can be difficult,” he said, “you have to plan trips and they don’t always work out.”

With the growth in class size, he notes that research funding has also grown to over $45 million since the college’s inception four years ago.

“We will be needing more space, so we definitely hope to be growing more buildings and more opportunities, not only here in Spokane but at our other campuses,” he said.

Catch up on the day’s news and look ahead to tomorrow by signing up for the Daily Local email newsletter from KXLY4. Headlines, events, and staff picks every weeknight at 8 p.m. Sign up HERE to get your news on the D.L.

COPYRIGHT 2023 BY KXLY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS MATERIAL MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED, BROADCAST, REWRITTEN OR REDISTRIBUTED.