Tower Health, Drexel University to build medical school in Berks County

Tower Health and Drexel University plan to bring a four-year medical school to Berks County, officials with the two organizations announced Monday.

The two nonprofits are still looking for a location for the school near Reading Hospital’s West Reading campus, but the plan calls for enrolling the facility’s first class of students during the 2020-21 school year.

“We’re proud to have the Drexel flag fly in Reading,” Drexel President John Fry said during an event at Reading Hospital.

The move comes at a time of sweeping changes for Reading Hospital and its parent company, Tower Health. In the fall, Tower Health acquired five for-profit hospitals in southeast Pennsylvania as part of a $418 million deal.

For years, Reading Hospital served as a local provider, offering an increasing scope of specialty care and services in Berks. Then, through the recent acquisitions, it spread its scope to cover 1.5 million residents across southeastern Pennsylvania.

Now its goal is to become an academic medical center, Tower Health President and CEO Clint Matthews said.

“We’ve had academia and teaching as part of our mission,” Matthews said. “This is greatly expanding upon that.”

How it happened

Matthews said some of the best hospitals in the country – such as the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, the Cleveland Clinic and Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore – share one thing: They’re academic medical centers.

Last spring, officials from Drexel approached Matthews about placing third- and fourth-year medical students at Reading Hospital for their clinical training. The partnership would have been similar to others Drexel has with regional hospitals in the state.

Matthews wasn’t interested in that proposal, because he wanted to go even bigger.

“If there was an opportunity for a broader picture and a broader scope, I’d have strong interest,” he said he told them at the time.

Since that initial conversation, the two organizations have been working in earnest to develop the four-year branch campus of the Drexel University College of Medicine. Pending proper accreditation, the school will bring in students to take classes in the sciences over the first two years. Then, those students will progress to their clinical training in years three and four.

The idea for a branch campus quickly gained momentum on both sides, said Dan Schidlow, dean of the Drexel’s College of Medicine.

“He was very clear that he wanted a big presence here,” Schidlow said of Matthews. “He wanted a real commitment of both parties. When we learned that, a flame was ignited and we’ve done this very quickly.”

The two sides have a memorandum of understanding, but there are still details to be worked out. Both nonprofits described it as a joint venture.

The cost to open the school and the number of employees at the branch campus are still to be determined, Matthews said.

Reading Hospital will accept third- and fourth-year Drexel students in July 2019, with the initial class of medical students starting its four years of school in August 2020.

The new branch campus will bring about 200 medical school students to the area in the initial years with the opportunity to grow from there, Matthews said.

It also could be an asset to recruit physicians who want to be part of an academic medical center, officials said.

“These guys have big ideas and are doing big things, but they are also very modest and very focused on execution and results, which is in character with our College of Medicine,” Fry said.

Drexel’s perspective

With an enrollment over 1,000, Drexel already has one of the country’s largest medical schools.

It places its students in other hospitals, but the partnership with Tower Health is on another level, Schidlow said.

He said the Reading area comes with a strong appeal. It has a diverse patient body that comes from rural and urban settings.

“It has all the richness in terms of health care, physician opportunities and patient opportunities,” Schidlow said. “There are patient challenges in Reading that are important for students to learn about and to learn how to address.”

Drexel will bring more than medical school students to Berks, Schidlow said.

“We believe we’re not only bringing the medical school, but we’re going to bring the university,” he said. “We think we can bring some of that expertise here. Other parts of the university that are interested in health, such as bioengineering, a variety of things.”

Fry said the nation is facing a shortage of physicians. By 2030, that physician shortfall could be anywhere between 40,000 and 100,000, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.

In Berks County, there’s only one primary care physician for every 1,510 residents, according to a recent report from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. That’s below the state average of one per 1,230 residents.

“We all know as baby boomers live longer, we’re going to need more doctors,” Fry said. “That’s one of the missions that we share today.”

Beyond brick and mortar

The partnership with Drexel marks the latest big move by Tower Health.

In October, Tower Health acquired five for-profit hospitals in southeast Pennsylvania and changed its name from the Reading Health System.

Last year, the health system also got into the health insurance business through a partnership with Pittsburgh-based UPMC Health Plan.

Another proposed project would bring a 144-bed inpatient behavioral health hospital to Bern Township.

During an interview, Matthews rattled off a series of recent health care surveys and reports about the improving quality of care at Reading Hospital.

Four years ago, the hospital ranked 34th among Pennsylvania’s hospitals, according to U.S. News and World Report. Last year, it climbed to seventh overall.

“I knew we couldn’t stay insular and be inward-looking within the confines of our bricks and mortar,” Matthews said of the health system’s growth. “We needed to be looking out into the communities, and we looked at different communities where we have the opportunity to improve care.”

The partnership with Drexel is another piece of the bigger picture that Matthews called transformative for the health system and for Berks County.

“It’s a game-changer for our community with several hundred medical students receiving training on our campus,” he said. “They become the fabric of our organization as we populate the medical staffs of tomorrow within our community.”

Contact Matthew Nojiri: 610-371-5062 or mnojiri@readingeagle.com.