New YSU, LECOM partnership focuses on primary care doctors

A new educational affiliation between Youngstown State University and Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine will provide students in the YSU-BaccMed program with opportunities for joint or early admission to LECOM.

The YSU-BaccMed program, which enrolled its first cohort of students in Fall 2016, allows individuals who want to become primary care physicians to earn both bachelor’s and medical degrees within a variety of timelines, including a compressed, six-year period with the new affiliation.

“With both NEOMED and LECOM as medical partners, YSU is now the hub of a new integrated pre-med/med consortium dedicated to educating primary care physicians,” said Stephen Rodabaugh, professor and YSU-BaccMed liaison officer.

Students in YSU-BaccMed earn a three- or four-year bachelor of science in special, high-level biological sciences or biochemistry pathways, followed by three or four years of medical school, depending on the medical school program.

The new agreement with LECOM allows students to apply for joint admission to LECOM and YSU-BaccMed during their senior year in high school, or they may apply to LECOM in their first or second year at YSU.

“Both the new LECOM agreement and the existing agreement with NEOMED provide our BaccMed students preferential consideration and early assurance,” explained Rodabaugh,  “but, with the addition of LECOM, we can now offer our students both allopathic and osteopathic pathways to their medical degree.”

LECOM is the nation’s largest medical college and the only Academic Health Center in the osteopathic profession. A private institution with its main campus in Erie, Pa., LECOM has additional campuses in Seton Hill (Greensburg), Pa., in Elmyra, NY, and in Bradenton, Fla.