New training programs might bolster Wichita's image

13-Jan-2011

BY JERRY SIEBENMARK
The Wichita Eagle
January 13, 2011

The first group of first-year medical students will begin classes this year at the University of Kansas School of Medicine-Wichita.

Nearby, the first students of the Wichita campus of the KU School of Pharmacy will start their training.

And Wichita State University's fledgling Advanced Education in General Dentistry program will move into its new building on the grounds of the Hughes Metropolitan Complex at 29th North and Oliver.

In the health care business, all three developments are significant to strengthening Wichita's claim as a regional health care hub.

They also promise a significant boost to the local economy.

But the effect those expanded and new entities will have on luring outside companies to expand or relocate here is not straightforward.

The presence of the advanced medical training facilities could help economic developers recruit companies here, some say.

But others question whether the three schools and programs will really give the Wichita area an advantage over other cities and regions in economic developers' efforts to bring new companies and jobs to town.

H. David Wilson, dean of the medical school, said the school's expansion from training third- and fourth-year medical school students to training them from beginning to end means a greater influx of good and smart people who "I think will add to the expertise and intelligence of the community."

"They are taxpayers and by and large, they are law-abiding citizens," Wilson said.

The same can be said for students attending the pharmacy school, he said.

The expansion of the medical school and the pharmacy school will have at least an additional $30 million impact, said Jeremy Hill, director of the Center for Economic Development and Business Research at WSU, citing a CEDBR study conducted last year. The study did not include WSU's general dentistry residency program, which last year accepted its first class of dentists.

The combination of the three programs will improve the area's health care system, Hill said.

"It's a good thing for us," Hill said. "And it will have positive effects on us down the road."

Those positive effects may or may not include economic development.

Vicki Pratt Gerbino, president of the Greater Wichita Economic Development Coalition, said the expanded medical education programs are "one more feather in our cap" but don't represent a sea change in the area's attractiveness to site selectors.

"At the end of the day, this stuff only matters if somebody who is very well placed within the company or whoever's on the top management team considers this a place that they are actually going to live," Gerbino said.

More often than not, Gerbino said, companies are largely looking at the financial benefits of moving or expanding to a different location. They aren't looking as hard at quality-of-life issues.

"When we are having these conversations with companies, what matters to them is the bottom-line impact," Gerbino said.

Matt Szuhaj, a director with Deloitte Consulting in San Francisco, said the schools level the playing field for Wichita when competing with other metro areas for relocations and expansions.

"Is it going to give you a distinct advantage? No. But it will keep you on par with your competitors," Szuhaj said.

But David Brandon, senior vice president of Site Selection Group in Dallas, said the addition of advanced medical training programs and schools could be enough to catch the attention of some business executives.

"Overall it's a meaningful addition to Wichita's kit bag of attractive characteristics," Brandon said.

Brandon was an author of a study last year commissioned by GWEDC to examine how Wichita can improve its economic development effort in the coming decade.

The study recommended that the area utilize its medical and manufacturing assets and expertise to get into medical device manufacturing, an area already being tapped by the Center of Innovation for Biomaterials in Orthopaedic Research.

Brandon said the presence of the schools could lead to some relocations of health-care-related companies.

"If you look across the country you can see there are ancillary investments that occur simply because of their (medical and pharmacy schools) presence," he said.

And bolstered medical and health care education in the area will probably mean more research projects, a point reiterated by the medical school's Wilson.

"I think you can expect an increase in that kind of activity," Brandon said.

The increased research from both the medical and pharmacy schools could, in the long run, help the area's economic development, said Deloitte's Szuhaj.

That is, if the medical research leads to successful commercialization in a targeted area, such as what CIBOR is doing with the use of composites for bone replacement.

"The most effective clusters have a really defined identity," he said. "They don't try to be all things to all people."

But just the presence of a full-fledged medical school, pharmacy school and dentist residency program will not mean a huge leg up for Wichita in the competitive economic development environment.

"Most regions have that same thought," Szuhaj said. "It's just incremental, at best."

Reach Jerry Siebenmark at 316-268-6576 or jsiebenmark@wichitaeagle.com.

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